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THE CEISIS : 



ITS EATIONALE. 



PART I.— OUR NATIONAL FORCE THE PROPER REMEDY. 

PART II.— RESTORATION OF LEGITIMATE AUTHORITY THB 
END AND OBJECT OF THE WAR. 



BY THOMAS J. SIZER. 



BUFFALO: 

BREED, BUTLER & CO 

1862. 



THE CEISIS : 



ITS EATI<:)XATE 



PAST 1—^'jT?. yAricvAi j:l 

ESD ANT) OBJECT 



BY THI'MAS J. 5IZER. 




if I. X X -3. i- V_' I 

BREED, BITLER A CO. 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1862, 

Bt breed, butler & CO., 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Northern District 

of Xew York. 



STEaEOTVPKD .VSD PbWTKD BY 

R. WHEELER & CO. 
Commercial Adv. BuUdiDgs, Buffalo. 



PREFACE. 



A crisis ill national affairs is not necessarily measured by days or months. 
The tiist part of this endeavor to show the rationale of that through which 
our nation is passing, was published early in May, 1S61. It announced facts 
ana principles that have since been more fully realized. The magnitude 
of the occasion continues, and reasons similar to those which prompted the 
first publication seem now to require its extension. 

The first part not being temporary in character and purpose, and beincv 
introductory to, and closely connected with, what is now added in the 
second part, it is republished therewith. 

It is not supposed by the author that a full statement of the philosophy 
of this crisis can be embodied in a biit-f publication; but it is believed 
that leading principles, being recognized, even though briefly and imper- 
fectly stated, the whole subject may be more easily comprehended and 
acted on. 

The first part was so entirely impersonal, that the author's name seemed 
immaterial. It being necessary, in the part now added, to treat somewhat 
of the actors in the history which we are making, remaining anonvmous 
would, perhaps, not be entirely justifiable." 

T. J. S. 
BiFFALO. June. 1SG2. 



THE CRISIS : ITS PiATIO?(ALE. 



The time has come for tlie exposure of a great, and, it may be, 
a disastrous fallacy in the political reasoning of our people. Re- 
garding interest as the controlling power in worldly aftairs, the 
States as sovereign, and that sovereignty referable to the masses 
of the people in each State, under our republican system, they 
have assumed that slavery must abide the sure action of the prin- 
ciples of political economy, and live or die, according as enlight- 
ened self-interest, acting upon the whole people of each State, 
influenced by climate and productions, shall determine. 

Prominent political men, seeking excuses for inaction or acqui- 
escence, have repeatedly advanced this sedative doctrine ; and 
people of all parties have too readily accepted it as true. 

The error consists in overlooking the fact that the interest of 
the slaveholder is great and permanent, and is not the interest of 
the State; and that the interest of the State does not control po- 
litical action. In the case of slavery, republicanism is not per- 
mitted to act ; the people of the Slave States are not permitted to 
be enlightened in regard to their interest on the subject, and if 
t.iey were enlightened, they are not permitted, as against slaverv, 
/.o control the action of their States. This is not in accordance 
with the theory and philosophy of our system, but it is our actual 
condition, and whoever would help our country, in its present cri- 
sis, should know it and give it thoughtful heed. The necessities 
of slavery create for it a political system that is really irreconcil- 
able with our constitutional political system. 

The system of government devised by oui fathers, is one of 
most perfect and practical republicanism. It differs from other 
systems of republicanism, especially in its provisions for great 
national power and expansion, combined with provisions for com- 
plete local self-government, guaranteed against revolutionary 



4 OUR KPJPCliLICAN SYSTEM. 

violence and pliysical force. Its true character was so well des- 
cribed by Mr. Calhoun,* that his language is copied here, not 
only as a clear and correct statement, but also as a valuable 
testimony from one whose example and teachings have never- 
theless, done much, very much, to defeat the practical working 
of our system, according to his own explanation of its nature and 
intention. Treating of the guarantees in the Constitution against 
external and internal violence towards a State, and against 
encroachment by rulers, he says : 

" Having now answered your several qnestions, I deem it dne, both to myself 
and the occasion, to state in conclusion what, according to the opinion T enter- 
tain would be the effects of these gnarantees, on the supposition that the Federal 
Government shall faithfully discharge the duties they impose. 

" The great and leading effect would be, to put an end to all changes in the form of 
government and Constitutions of the States, originating in force '^r revolution ; unless, 
indeed, they should be effected against the united resistance of the State and the Federal 
Go\ ernment. It would give to the government and constitution of each, the stability of 
the whole ; so that no one could be subverted without subverting, at the same lime, the 
whole system; and this I believe to have been the intention of the framers of Ihe Fed- 
eral Constilution in inserting the guarantee seclion. TheyM-ere experienced and wise 
men, and did their work effectually. They had carried the country successfully through, 
by their wisdom and patriotism, the most remarkable political revohition on the 
records of history, and firmly established the Constitutions and Governments of the 
Slates, composing the Union, on the great principles of popular liberty, in Avhich it 
originated. Nothing was left undone to perfect their great and glorious task, but to 
reconstruct, on more correct and solid principles, the common Constitution and Gov- 
ernment of all the States, and bind them into one compact and durable structure. 
This was their crowning work ; and how well it was performed, the Federal Consti- 
tution and Government will stand more durable than brass, an everlasting monument 
of their wisdom and patriotism. 

'' But very imperfect, indeed, would their task have been left, if they had not 
adopted effectual means to guard all the parts against the lawless shocks of violence 
and revolution. They were too deeply read in the history of free and confederated 
States not to know the necessity of taking effectual guards against them ; and for this 
))urj)Ose, inserted in the Constitution the guarantee section, Avhich will effectually and 
forever guard against those dangerous enemies of popular and constitutional govern- 
ments, if the Federal Government shall faithfully do its duty. They would, in such 
case, effectually close the doors, on every side, against their entrance, — whether at- 
lempled l)y invasion from mitliout, domestic violence from icitliin, or through the law- 
less ambilion and usurpation of rulers. 

" But while the framers of the Federal Constitution thus carefully protected the 
system against changes by the rude hand of violence and revolution, they were 
too exj)erienced and wise to undertake to close the door against all changes. They 
well knew that all the works of man, whatever may be their skill, are imperfect ot 
themselves, and liable to decay ; and that, in order to perfect and perpetuate what 

• See his lett-^r to Hon. William Smith, of Rhode Island, July 3, 1843, in the 6th 
vol. of Calhoun's works, p. 234. 



ITS IJESCKirTION BY MR. CALHOUN. 

they had done, it was necessary to provide a remedy to correct its Imiierfections 
and repair tlic injuries ot time, l)y making such changes as the one or the other might 
require. They also knew that, if such changes were not permitted, violence and 
revolution would, iu time, burst. open the doors which they had so carefully closed 
against them, and tear down the whoie system in their blind and unskillful attempts 
to repair it. Nor were they ignorant that, in piovidiug for amendments, it would be 
necessary, in order to give suflicicnt stability to the system, to guard against hasty 
and thoughtless iuTiovations, but, at the same time, to avoid such restrictions as 
would not leave sufficient facility for making the reciuisite changes. And this 
too. is executed with the same wisdom and skill which characteiized every other 
part of their work in the various provisions contained in the Federal {'(;nstitution lor 
amendments;— which, while they atfbrd sufficient guards against innovations, afford 
at the same time, sufiicient facility ibr the objects contemplated. But one thing still 
remained to perfect their work. 

" It might be that the party in power would be opposed to all changes, and that, 
in consecpience of the door being thus closed against force and revolution, and the 
restrictions impo.sed on the amending power,, in order to prevent hasty innovations, 
— they might make successful resistance against all attempts to amend the constitu- 
tion, however neces.sary, if no adequate provision were made to prevent it This they 
foresaw, and provided against it an ample remedy ; after explaining which, I shall 
close this long communication. 

" The framers of the Federal Constitution were not only experienced and wise 
men, but firm believers also in the capaeitv of their fellow-citi7ens for self-government. 
It was in the full persuasion of the correctness of this belief that, after having excluded 
violence and revolution, or physical force as the means of change, and placed ade- 
quate guards against innovation, they opened wide the doors — never to be closed — 
for the free and full operation of all the moral elements in favor of change; not doubt- 
ing that if reason be left free to combat error, all the amendments which time and ex- 
perienee might show to be necessary, would, in the end be made; and that the system, 
under their salutary influence, would go on indefinitely, purifying and i erfecting it- 
self. Thus thinking. — the liberty of the press,— the freedom of speech and debate, — 
the trial by jury, — the privilege of habeas co7-pus, — and the right of the people 
peaceably to assemble together, and petition for a redress of grievances, — are all put 
under the sacred guarantee of the Federal Constitution, and secured to the citizen 
against the power both of the Federal and State (Jovernments. Thus it is, that the 
same high power, which guarantees protection to the governments of the States against 
change or subversion by physical force, guarantees, at the same time, to the citizens 
protection against restrictions on the unlimited use of these great moral agents for 
<'!fecting such changes as reason may show to be necessary. Nor ought their over- 
powering efficacy to accomplish the object inteiKled, to be doubted. Backed by jier- 
si'verance and sustained by these powerful auxiliaries, reason in the end will surely 
prevail over error and alju.se, however obstinately maintained; — and this the more 
surely, by the exclusion of so dangerous an ally as mere brute force. The operation 
may be slow, but will not be the less sure. Nor is the tardiness an objection. All 
changes in the fundamental laws of the State, ought to be the work of time, ample 
discussion, and reflection; and no people who lack the requisite perseverance to go 
through the .slow and difficult process necessary at once to guard against improper 
innovations, and to insure wise and salutary changes, -or who are ever ready to re- 
sort to revolution, instead of reform, where ♦form may be practicable, — can preserve 
their liberty. Nor would it be desirable, if it were practicable, to make the requisite 
changes without going through a long previous process of discussion and agitation. 
They are indispensable mean.s, — the only school (if I may be allowed theexpres.sion,) 



6 OUK PKACTICK DOES NOT ACCORD WITH OrK THE.^RY. 

in oar ease, tbat can diffiise and. fix in the mind of the eommimitT. the jKrincipleft aod 
doctrines ntcessanr to uphoM our complea: but beautif nl system of goTerament&. La 
none that ever exbted. are they so much req^uired; and in none were they ever eakii- 
lated to produce saeh powerful effect Its very complicatioQ — so many dbtinet 
sovereign and independent States, each vrith its separate government and all united 
anderoae — fe calculated to give a force t<> disciJ^sioQ and agitation, never before 
^owTL — and to cause a diffusioo of political intelligeace heretofore nnknown in the 
histor V of the world. — if the Federal Government shall do its duty under the guarantees 
of the Constitution by thus promptly suppressing physical force as an eiement of 
change. — and keeping wide open the door for the foil and free action of all the moral 
elements in its fiivor. Noi people ever had so fair a start All that is lacking Is. that 
we shall understand in aD. lis great and beautiful proportions the noble political strae- 
ture reai-ed by the wisdom and patriotism of our ancestors, and. to have the virtue 
and the sense to preserve and protect it." 

This is^ nndoubtedl V, tlie true tlieorr of our government ; re- 
pnMicstmsm giuirante^ to every State — the libertr of the press 
— the Ireedom of speech and debate — the trial bj jury — the 
privilege of hah as e&rpu» — and the right of the people peace- 
ably to assemble together, and petition for a redress of grievances 
— all put under the sacred guarantee of the Federal Constitution 
and secured to the citizens against the power both of the Federal 
and State Governments. 

Such is our theory — our system ; but such, unfortunately, is 
not our practice, especially where slavery is concerned. We 
think it logically demonstrable tbat slavery cannot permanently 
coexist with republicanism thus guaranteed. W.e think our 
Others knew this, and that they expected, when they guaranteed 
republicanism, in the States and did not guarantee slavery there, 
that republicanism would root out slavery. We think, also, that 
they who are determined, in every event, to hold on to slavery, 
are also aware of its real incompatibility with our system, and 
that to this, are to be ascribed their persevering attempts, first, to 
change our system by construction, and, failing in this, to with- 
draw from it with their chenshed " institution." 

The known necessities of slavery have canse<i to grow up in 
these United States, wherever slavery exists, a system utterly at 
war with onr proper system, and with many of the plainest and 
most important provisions of our Constitution. The liberty of the 
press, the free<iom of speech and debate, do not, and cannot, 
exist, where slavery is to be permanent. The trial by jury, the 
privilege of Jiobeas corpus, ana the right of the people peaceably 
to assemble together and petition tor a redress of grievances, may 
not be violated by statutory enactments, or judicial constmction. 



in Slave S^&t<ee ; bat Tigiljamne OaumiXce^ - - ~ ~ ^-^^^^av, £uper- 

sede ':<^er la^. and provide e&ed-rel^ iii:'<*jwitLi€K!^ flf 

slaverv. Tne tla-re la^r? of Kansas si-.tcksri 

tiie f'e'i'plc- a^d €veL *•" - ~~- '-: ^- — ^ - : . . _. . j 

sioBS were d^ vors-- irerr. €xir: . 

enfi'j^-c-d where Siaverr exl=^r - :_.-.;'....:._:._..„ :_t- 

wiieiiier tiie law la a'iiclitJi.iic: _ ■ -zz t'j Jiadz^ l^y-^th. o-z ''•^-j' 

a r. " . ■ - . 

m^ :.-; _- : .^ : ___ _:: :_. . : ._ .. 

inteilec: r^rri^e, saj? : 



7^.< : .^pl'f fif m- - 



ot me ease, it mue* 
maneot. earrks wiiii ::, 

sjstem of ^r'Terameiii m. 
pre=errati.:.iii. -a-batever t^aj b-e 



State £•:- ■ ' "T 

sbare !:-•-_ 
serrkat'Je. 

T, --: - ■-.---,- 

at :.. - ^ - ■ 
in ibi? Um — . &:xtae 

— have bee-n m . " 

Lrin^ »: ie "rv j - - 



» SLAVERY 18 NEVER ABOLISHED BY SLAVEHOLDERS. 

ing no better soil or climate or natural productiveness, the general 
and aggregate wealth of the people and their standard of living 
are seen to be vastly inferior to those of the Free States. There 
stands the fact, too patent for denial or equivocation. Yet not in 
one of these States is that law of self-interest which is so much 
relied on, working, however gradually, the extinction of slavery. 
Surely if the law were so potent, forty years are long enough for 
it to begin to act. Obviously it is not true that slavery will be 
abandoned when it becomes unprofitable to a State, or to thepeo- 
ple of a State ; because the republican system contemplated by 
our fathers, and guaranteed by the Constitution, does not prevail 
in the Slave States, but is overborne and crushed out there by the 
despotic necessities of slavery. Hence it is, that, gradually, there 
has grown up in the Slave States, a systematic distrust of majori- 
ties. More and more their State Constitutions have guarded 
against popular influences, especially where slavery is concerned ; 
and Mr. Calhoun, during the latter part of his life, expressed fre- 
quent apprehension and dread of what he called " the tyranny of 
majorities," and gave much attention to contriving methods 
whereby the minority might check and control the majority. 

The example of some States that did actually abolish slavery, 
will, perhaps, be cited as against our reasoning, but it is not. 
Slavery in those States had not yet attained the political control, 
and men were then nearer to the times and more imbued with the 
spirit of the revolution. Republicanism was not then suppressed, 
but was active and dominant in those States, according to the true 
intent and meaning of the Constitution. Freedom of discussion 
and the interest of the masses prevailed over the interest and 
desires of the slaveholdei*3. If any of the latter favored the move- 
ment it was because their sense of right or their other interests 
overcame their interests as slaveholders. Had the question been 
left to the slaveholders in those States, tlieir interest would never 
have led them to abolish slavery. It was the interest of the 
masses sustained by their moral convictions, enacting and enforc- 
ing positive legal prohibitions, against the interests and wishes 
of slaveholders, that abolished slavery in those States ; and not 
the changed interests or relaxing cupidity of the slaveholders 
themselves. Where slaveholders have the political power, slavery 
will never be abolished, whatever may be its impoverishing effects 
on the State or the masses of the people ; and this law will pre- 



PRICE MEASURES ITS VALUE. 9 

vail wliatever the climate or the prodnclions of the State. The 
law of interest does not work there, through the masses, to abolish 
slavery, but through the slaveholders, to perpetuate it. 

Tiie interest of the slaveholder in his slave is, always and every- 
where, precisely measured by the marketable pecuniary value ot 
the slave — by his price. Where a slave can be sold for fifty dol- 
lars, that fact signifies that, in that case, slavery, or the right or 
legal ability to hold the person in bondage, is actually worth fifty 
dollars to the master. So if the price be ten dollars, or five 
thousand dollars, the price measures the marketable value to the 
master, of the relation between him and his bondman. And 
therefore, wherever a slave will sell for anything^ slavery is val- 
uable to the master, and therefore his interest will not lead him 
to abolish it. There is no part of the United States in which 
slavery, or the unlimited right of one man to appropriate the ser- 
vices of another, would not be pecuniarily and largely valuable. 
The colored people of Chicago would, if held there as slaves, con- 
stitute a large pecuniary interest of their owners. The legal right 
and ability to work a gang of stalwart fugitives in the Canadian 
forests, would insure a fortune there, to their master: and Gov. 
^Yise was right when he told us of the great pecuniary value of 
slaves to dig for gold in California, if only slavery were legalized 
and protected there. Some pertinent statements and statistics 
are copied here, from the letter of an intelligent observer who was 
traveling in Kentucky.* He says : 

" It is a common assertion that the complete substitntion of free labor for slave 
labor would be profitable, and that even without Abolition action and outside pres- 
sure, such change would be produced, in a somewhat longer time, by the choice of 
the slaveholders, directed by considerations of economy. There is no proposition 
more groundless. If free labor was more cheap and profitable, many slaveholders 
would have learned it, and have already made the complete substitution. This has 
not occurred, as I am informed, on a single form in Kentucky, unless where the easy 
access of Abolitionist negro-stealors renders the holding of slaves too hazardous. If 
any reliance really were placed in this oflen-asserted dogma, the certain result would 
have been seen in a great diminution of the number of slaves, and even remote from 
the Abolition border, compared to the whites. (3n the contrary, the pro])ortion of 
slaves has been increased, and greatl,y, from the census of 1790 to the last of 1850 — 
and regularly to 1840. The small relative diminution between 1810 and 1850, (though 
still with an absolute increase in that time of 28,72o slaves), may safely be ascribed, 
and entirely, to the incendiary action of Northern Abolitionists, and not, in the least. 

* His letter is dated at Frankfort, Ky., and was published in the Charleston Mer- 
cury, Sejit 24, 18(50. 



10 CLIMATE DOES NOT CONTKOL SJ,AVEEY. 

to negro shivovy boins; othorwise less profitable. The proportions in Kentucky have 
been very nearly as follows: 

'' 1790. there was one .<lave to every five white inhabitants. 

'• ISOO. there was one slave to every four and a half white inhabitants. 

'• 1810. there was one slave to every four white inhabitants. 

'• 1S20. thei-e was one slave to every three and a half white inhabitants. 

'• 1S30. there was one slave to every three white inhabitants. 

" lS-10. there was one slave to every three white inhabitants. 

-ISoO. thei-e was one slave to every three and a half white inhabitants. 

'• If the smaller proportional increase of slaves in the last cited decade was caused 
bv diminution of their economical value, (if not affected by Abolition action), it be- 
comes those who maintain that general proposition to show what difference has 
occunvd in the asricultnre of Kentucky, or otherwise, to produce such change of 
value in labor. In truth, there are "few, if any agriculturists, and none in this better 
portion of Kentnckv. who do not use, or would not prefer, slaves to hired free labor- 
ers—as would lie th'e case, if the choice were free, in every now free State where the 
climate is as mild. And if fanaticism and legal prohibition and penalties did not 
prevent the hokiing of nesro slaves, and their secure and quiet possession anywhere, 
thev would be bousht and held in numbers, and to great advantage, for menial em- 
ploVments and as house servants, in every now non-slaveholding State, without regard 
to severitv of climate. At least, all wealthy house-keepers would rejoice to own 
ne-ro slaves as domestic servants, to save their wives and daughters from their pres- 
ent" toil and drudgery, in acting as servants, and performing all the most revoltmg, 
deo-radin'^. and debasing duties of such .service. _ 

"'•XecTro slaverv k nowhere now kept out of either the new Territones. or he 
older Xorthern States, bv its being unprofitable for every employment ; but is exduded 
bv positive prohibitorv iaws and penalties, and still more by the prevailing anti-slav- 
ei^fenaticism. which "alone would render property in slaves entirely insecure and 
worthless- and make the possessor odious in the highest degree. If negro slaves could 
be takento.andheld securely under the laws in any State or Territory, where the profit 
or convenience of owners would require, they would spread into every N orthern Kate, 
and be demanded in such numbei^. that a million of slave population, to be there 
held would not more than maintain the needed supply. The most earnest advocates 
for the advantages of the institution of negro slavery, and for its ^eatest extension 
would ask no bener means for the desired ends, than the fair and full application of 
the rule of leaving the demand lor slaves, and the profits of their employment, with 
their secure possession, to direct and limit their use, and to determine the extension 
and limits of the institution of negro slavery." 

To this testimonv we add. (what all must tnow). that the vices 
and passions of men contribute largely to sustain slavery every- 
where • and also that, contrarv to general impression, the Census 
shows^ the expectation of life of colored persons to be greater in 
New Endand than in Louisiana. 

TVe think the observations alx)ve quoted substantially correct, 
and that tlie pecuniarv interest of slaveholders can nowhere be 
relied on to relax human bondage- If thc7j control the State, the 

* See abstract of U. S. Census. 1550. p. 13. 



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13 KIvlMHU U'ANISM UK SI AVIKY 



-WIIUMl ? 



iu spoci«Uos?su>n,(Nuv. 20, lS(H)),^akl, rotVnitii; io tho puM, it luul 
boon tlio opiiiiun of uuiny, 

•■Tltut «Tmir lit still aotoiul uuiwlvo^ iu U«o luiuu, b.v Uu- iow»-v ».f our Slate 
Ki.NTiuuuMits, «<.n</^ th, (U(i (-r t/K- /^t-t/t;na Owmmimt tint wlion. iu n iwont javs^l- 
iUuititU t>li<<tioi,. »v hu-HV nuyuilly havt* tlwrnnl thtvl tt.' Fnirrai (.Vrrrrn)*.".*, w.M. (.1/ 
Us imtmim immr (>« irAWt m nlmi /hr i>tvki-Ui>n, ^\m\\ lunvivftor U> aOnui.i.-loitHl 
by tho «uuo class of i.u'u nvIk. luwo U<ou ^uWty of lUl tluw «cts of vIoKmuv ,u..1 Inul 
fiiUli, U is lolly, It i-s uruIhoss, to lu)i>v for safety in sueii » gvvermuout." 

The sentences we litwo itnlicit^ed, show tho point for which tlie 
qnotution is ♦;iven. 

Mr. lUiett, ul" ^ontli rmolina, ft proniinont loink-r in iho scocs- 
su.n movement, and when jnst eleeted to the Convention, sitivl, 
(^Nov. 1:3, 18(U>): 

'* Tho Southoru ConllHkn-aoy, ought to U« «i SUv> c-lioKlinp <\>nfoUon\cy. It is m> 
exi)oiiuieiit tluU fiw govornuK'ut should exist iu sUwoltoMiug oouutwos. The Ki>i'"»- 
lU-sof Uouu'«mlUivwi--stilltho light uud gK.iy of muieut timos-woiv b.ult oi> 
doniostic sluvoiT. lUit it iv »n oxi'onu.eut to nuviutuiu thv govviinuout with uuivor- 
t<ul suttVugo, tvud tho whole i>opuhvtion to wutiol the goveruinont. 

- l-oi.uUitiou iuoivases faster tlum eupitul, «ud uo rrosinnity eau loug stave ot] 
the dire coutliet which uuist arise betwmi want and attlueuci^-i.oi.uhvtu.u and cap- 
ital. Where the great uuijoritv of the populatiou have no pivprrii/, wh.ch is the case 
with every nation in Kun.pe, what shall protect pivperty under the contn-l oi ihw 
.naiority t\x..n partition or ci.ntiscatiou ? What is libe.ty worth with starvation ; and 
what is property worth with contlscatiun ? Our Confederacy must be a Slaveholding 
(\.ufcderucy. We hase had enough of a confederacy with dissimilar instUulious. 

Vice-Pi-esident Stephens, in a speech hilely, at Athmta. (ieor-ia, 
where he liad a ]nil.lie reequion, speakin- of their new Constitu- 
tion, ^aiil : 

>• The changes in our Constitution wc.v made with a view to conform to our.^oci:U 
institutions, and atVoid a greater pi»teclion to our slavi> ptopcrty." 

Thus, kn.kin- into the ival reason o( our prosont ditTundtios, it 
i8 iound in (/icNar^^itu-^or^hireri/jora,i<vc: mitioiud frokcdon 
—an inherent ineonomitv between Shivery aiid Kei>nblieanisin— 
between thosvstoni\\hich slaverv neee.ssitates, and the system 
ouaranteed by our Federal Constitution. It is the irrepressible 
eontliet; and' the Sphynvquestion now propounded to us, is,— 
which shall prevail. Slavery and its now reeoo;ni/.ed necessities, 
or, the Kepubliean o-overnment founded by our fathers, and estab- 
lished bv our Constitution f 

Lot ns not be misunderstood. AVe are not prcsentm- uiune- 



J ; I .'.-.. 3^ ^^^^ jjj^^jyjjgttire, ntueb Jew are w*r ^ : " •:^ 

tjj;. : GoV«;:j;TJj«-;jt fchould, JJJ afjv Vaj'M'; :>- 

j^itj!:<; JIJ U4* 'Aip()\\i'\</ii of JbUv^^rv in tiie State*- Fvr aug-ijt ure j^are 

«M<i, ar '■ '■ ■ • • ••• • "'■ •■* •■• • '- - - --— - ' '■' '■'- ■*' ' •'--rTS, 

arj'l (';; -^ --t 

Bta.t«3» tW«M;h'«5)*, V....,-. . :. . ..,..;.. ...... ;..... ..^. .. . ., ...-....<;, 

l<;t it Jive, ami-, if It eafj. i\f/urh\i. Whtrrn it cani>'>t do i*o— and 
KTft \}c\UiV<i tlwit jx-r- jt cannot — ^tbere i» 

«/>w no i^osi^rsitiidSii, -.- - - . ;. . ; .x; ar;v, to put doM'jj 

r*^ju\ji]i^nmn in the Ktatwk. in or4er to «u«tiij;i i»Ja very tlx^re. 

and it do<;% not i; -...-...:-.. J ..,.• -.;. ,. ........ . ^e 

th<!} Con<!.tit«tion i» rij^bt ; and if telavenr, ztixiomly forecassting, 
tltiUiriu'm^ now tf> w?t tip it>, ^ a% yjimsnount to 

tb« (>>»<ttituti'^i, t)ii;n the Go ..-. - ... . — w,-; O-'nfetJtutJon, and 

T»</t Blavaryf am to l>e mikiacrtiti^L 

'Hjat th<; feubrcTeion of ou; ' • rn };iisi long b<i:*n 

d<;JiU;rately i/nr|Xyii*«fi and p....... ., ... > ija<i abundant eri- 

derj<jc, but did not «uffici«^jt]y U^ljere it> 'J'ljat J^ading Wfuthem 
journal, tb<; Ji'u;hrft//n/l Kruiuirer^ fcaid, atxnit tb<; Ifet of HeijUnn- 

'-■"'-'-=-■'♦ ^'- " -•■ .,, !^jjj.v5JLo-':''- -"--•'--•• '• •" V 

Ik'; 1- e/./Oiii*-mi r, 

•nrf -* 

of 

Mr. 1'j-K^tz.fMa w'/rjid ^/<; » T*f»fi^mz3-r rix'AfSJtfrjt in fav*-.' </f 

'?jfc bstr- 
i/M . ■ > »-v arxj 

*?» t. 



*' A '></.- 'v'>r«mif/rj n^;.<^tr ftilav'fr; ) «il^iL will 



'Hie same i>aper, in a «>ub»e^iuent article, (Oct. 14, lS5Cj, after 
carefallv (Ujuntinp^ up the military re$ource% of Virginia, says: 



14 FOECE, XOT KEASOX. KEIIED OS. 

.. .Vdd to this abundant provisonof war muniments, the fmits of her certain .einirc 
of Fo' tress Monroe with its weU stored arsenals, as well as the federal armory at 
Harpers Ferrv. on the first occurrence of hostilities with the North ; and her mdj^a y 
preiLtions would be very far from contemptible. The skUl of her people ..th he 
Sle and m horsemanship is proverbial ; and we speak the words of calm reflt^Uou 
^en"; sav. in no spirit of boastfulness, that if the North shottld undertake to m- 
'ade the So'uth. bv th!x,wing open her ports to free trade with foretgn naUons and 
"feine to allow Vederal duties to be collected in her waters, Yirgima could alone 

"^^"t^i^l^no boasts of these preparations ; but as surely as the sun shin^ 
over her beautiful fields, she will treat the election of an abolition candidate as a breach 
of he "eatv of 17S0. and a release of evety sovereign State in the South from a 1 part 
and lot in its stipulations. The South will then revert to free trade, her favonte and 
long-tired poHcv ; and her commerce ^vill be no longer shackled wtth a tribute o 
S50 000.000 to $75,000,000 in annual reventies. which constitute the grand federal 
corruption fund, to grasp which is the whole object of the abolition agitation, and 
^Mch has proved itself the • root of all the evils" which aflOict the country. 

The^e statements made more than fuur years ago, but, we pre 
=urae, not -enerallv believed then, can, perhaps, better be appre- 
preciated now, when the line of policy indicated, is so nearly 
followed out. Quotations, of like character, could easily be mul- 
tiplied. 1 J • J V. f 
A reaction to encourage slavery, was then, not only desired but 
hoped and expected. '^A common danger' -that is, from the 
people — "and a common necessity (slavery)" were prepanng 
the Slave States for the destruction of our republican system of 
government, and the establishment of a more "conservative" 
system— that is, one better guarded against the influence and 
power of the people — to wit, the oligarchical system of slavery. 
The "infidelity" alluded to, doubtless means the want of faith 
in slaverv as a Christian institution, the "materialism" and 
"asrarianism" so much dreaded, means, the regard for popular 
thrift and industry, favored by republicanism, and by "anarchy-^ 
is intended, government by the people, and the absence of arbi- 
trary control over them, by an oligarchy of masters. To obviate 
these dangers to slavery, to revolutionize a government which 
acknowledges and guarantees the right of the people to control it, 
was alreadv a settled purpose. Confident of the absolute political 
control of '"the South" by the slave interest, it already looked 
to the consolidation of its power. "Military habits," " firm 
union and devoted resolution," not reason, argument or justice, 
were, even then, relied on to carry the day against the people, to 



THET itZAX EzvoLmoy. 



15 



ovenhn.">w onr government, and to establish and perpetuate "the 
cnservative institution" of slavery. 

The successive steps in the pK»gress to this point, from the re- 
publican theorv and system, have been natural and orderly. 
First, the jealous anxiety of slavery for national control, as mani- 
fested in its avidity for Federal offices, and in its acquisition of 
Slave Territory and exclusion of Free Territory ; then the propo- 
sition to secure for itself, by constitutional amendment, a perpetual 
and equal share in the control of the general government, by 
means of a dual executive, etc. : then its demand for the abroga- 
tion of aU Federal restrictions on its extension and for protective 
federal legislation : and, finally, failing in these, revolution, to 
attain its purposes. 

We can, now, perhaps, better understand the true character of 
our present political crisis, and can see how fallacious it must be, 
to look for remedies in p«-»pular action, according to the prv»visions 
of our Constitution, in StaUs ir?tere ^overi/ lta4j»?iitu\il (.\>nt'':\. 
The time for such action there, is past. As well might we look 
for it, in any other despotic or oligarchical government. The 
necessities of slavery are in the full tide of successful domination 
:here, and necessity knows no other law — no other Constitution. 
This shows us why, in ^ivry St-.it< ic/itre &iai'eri/ l*us ^mtrvi of 
i?ii: Stut< Gc^vermrtent^ and Sij ha^ iH^alhd iVA/r" a^ thf govern 
m-^nt DE FACTO, no ajypfal to iTif jvty^c t> alloicvd. ic7.< w it 
iconhJ he attended icith the least risl' to slavery, or the revo<:iti?f\ 
ichieh it contemj^ates. People there, voters according to their 
existing constitutions, even a majority of them, may be really 
unwilling to be precipitated into revolution. T.hey cannot help 
it. Government is taken away fn.im them — never to be restored, 
till slavery again yields to the Fe^ieral Constitution, and to right- 
ful popular sovereignty in the States. This, it Mill not, lor the 
present, do. It will only yield to a greater necessity ; and this 
fact we may better understand first, than last. Republican rea- 
soning, in those States, is utterly vain ; for they who believe in iv 
there, have now no political power, and they who have the politi- 
cal power, do not believe in repxiblicanism, and understand, full 
well, what they are about, and that, to accomplish their purjx^ses, 
popular control, except when nuiddened into hostility to its real 
interests, must not be j^ermitted. They mean revolution, the 
supremacy of slavery, and a gv.-'verument better adapted than ours. 



16 THE PEOPLE IN SLAVE STATES, POWERLESS. 

to its necessities ; and we have no right now, to await, or idly to 
calcuhite on, the recuperative action of rej^ublicanism according 
to our Constitution, in tlie States which slavery has already suc- 
cessfully paralyzed. Murmurs of popular discontent, and even 
indignant denunciations, against the revolutionists, which now 
occasionally reach us, from the people of those States, are louder 
now, than they ever will be again, if the friends, in those States, 
to our government and our republican system, receive no outside 
support. Like the cries of shipwrecked sufferers, the popular 
murmurs there, will grow less and less. Even Austrian despotism 
relinquishes nothing that it can successfully hold. American 
despotism is, at least, eqnally intelligent and regardful of its in- 
terests ; and, we believe too, it is equally remorseless. Not right, 
not constitutional law, not superior power, is arrayed against our 
government, nor even an excited temporary and local popular 
enthusiasm, which will cool of itself; but calculating, interested 
cupidity and ambition, nnderstanding their own purposes and 
bent on their accomplishment, regardless alike, of popular rights 
and constitutional provisions. In nature and essence, it is the 
same power, and governed by the same motives, as that which, 
in every age of the world, has contemned the people, and trampled 
on their rights. 

Agencies are not wanting here, for its purposes. The very 
means designed to guard popular liberty, are, when perverted, 
the most efficient for "its destruction, Hon. James Guthrie, of 
Kentucky, quotes from a Georgia paper : 

'•We know as well as any one living that the whole movement for secession and 
t!ie formation of a new government, so far at least as Georgia is concerned, proceeded 
on only a quasi consent of the people, and was pushed through, under circumstances 
i)f great excitement and frenzy, by a fictitious majority. With all the appliances 
brought to bear, with all the fierce rushing, maddening events of the hour, the elec- 
tion of the 4th of January showed a falling off in the popular vote of 25,000 or 30,- 
000; and on the night of that election the co-operationists had a majority, notwith- 
standing the falling off, of nearly 3000. and an absolute majority of elected delegates 
of 79. But, upon assembling, by wheedling, coaxing, buying, and all the arts of 
deception, the Convention showed a majority of 31 against Governor Johnson's pro- 
position. 

" And thus," says Mr. Guthrie. " went one State out of the Union — against the 
voice of the people who elected the delegates to the Convention ! Now it is said that 
a majority of the po])ular vote of Alabama was cast against going out, but it so 
chanced that a small majority of the delegates were for secession while the bulk of the 
people were ojiposed to it, and they took Alabama out, and refused to let the people 



COXVEXTIOXS USUEP THEIK I'OWEE. 17 

hare anv voice in the matter. The vote of Louisiana too was against s«>ession. but 
the delegates suppressed it and took Louisiana out against the wishes of the people."' 

Conventions of the people, the legitimate purpose of which, is, 
to make governments more conformable to the popular will, are 
made the most efficient means for depriving the people of pi-liti- 
cal power, and removing it permanently out of their reach. 
Fracticallv they are coming to be used, as other governmental 
agencies have been used, from tii>ie immemorial, by the few to 
oppress the many. Somewhere' in every political system, tliere 
is assumed to be an embodied expression of sovereign power. 
Sovereignty, admitted to reside with the people, is supposed to 
be embodied in convention by delegation, and thence it has been 
too readily assumed that the political powers of a convention are 
unlimited and absolute. A little reflection must show to every 
one, the very great danger of this assumption. Grant it, and 
nothing more is needed, in order to subvert and revolutionize free 
government, than to get control, by whatever means, of the organ- 
ization of a convention. Its power is assumed to be illimitable, 
its sessions indefinite, its edicts supreme. Initiated by the legis- 
lature, it determines the manner oT constituting future legisla- 
tures, and so may secure perpetuity for any system which it chooses 
to inaugurate. Future legislatures, acting in the same interest, 
will not call future conventions, except at sucli times and in such 
manner as still further to promote and secure the same interest ; 
and even if the convention should assume to extinguish the legis- 
lature, where would be the remedy ? How avaih\ble are these 
instrumentalities for the utter subversion of all popular govern- 
ment, was exemplified in the case of Kansas, and the Lecompton 
Constitution. It is also exemplified now, by tlie revolutionary 
State Conventions. 

Popular liberty cannot survive tiie unchecked operation of this 
system. Delegates to a convention are not themselves sovereign, 
but only the servants of the real sovereigns, and submission of their 
action, to the deliberate judgment of the sovereign people, is not 
only an act of proper respect for the supreme power, but a check 
upon the exercise of delegated power, the use of which, the 
people can, with no safety, forego. If, in times past, the informal 
sanction of the people has, in some instances, been deemed sufii- 
cient, witli no propriety can the precedent be held to authorize the 
denial of their right of adoption or rejection in every case. The 



r:2lit is. in the nature of the case, inherent and indestractible. 
To d^iv. to ciicamscribe, «»■ to defeat it. is nsorpatian, and rebel- 
lion against the sovereign power- 

W lien the TTnited States GjEst:" ^nfiHined, it was 

i - ' val or rejec- 

I._.^- . . . - -. ^ ' " ' - :._-,. z - jf tii3s act is 

■O'ked, bj those -to withdraw legally bj 

^fUi CotnTcntion- A S:-;-' ' - '"er : 

tecaose this i'v~-' :-. W i^ - .. -_-^ ^;..._ .:^^"-.. =.-^: :hBS 

adopted, coo:- n JJnilLtd States Co-TiiTeiitioEs, or iip<m the 

b<:«dles anthorizci lo act as sabsiitates therefjr. It will be noted 

t' " ' " -' * "'e legitinaate * "' - of exertasing such power. 

oave two •: 5S of passing np:m such 

. cs. As Mr. Calhoan has 

>_ „ ^ lo.:.:,. ; .i^e Shode Island case, the 

pi&i'-T.lie-'s soreTieiairatv i- rTteised informally, bnt is only 

J " r? which they 



having", "with ~. T»Tescr. 

will :. ' ' ' ^ - - ijiie»i .'::-'.-a:-c? 

GijiVc::.— --U .^--.:, ^--..•.^: _• .-■..^:.,... .. :...-. in any oiLer 

way. The a55inBar>tion of snch rj<ower by a Staie Convention, is in 

J ■ ^ " ~ ■- Siat-e. as 

...... ^. .: :.-. ... : -,- : .-:._:.: ...:..:,. :.....,.. T^* ~e 

have Seen, in sev^. ^ ■ .^ Slave States, snch Tiower i^ 
Saaie \>j»r. ' " . . - . • - 

: J - operation, a national eov : 



:::^: ,..-:.....: .. ZiO power :::. 

these Staties to re^ist^ • .ise the State 

'' ■ i:.aTery. aad not by 'C&&\i^ji\^^\ 

. .- ■-.... ^_. aie e^ctive reaction of repnblican- 



--^. btate?. 



s even a greater, difficnlty lies back of 

Sta*^ are themselves, already, to an 

' i and eormpted by slavery. Tliey are 

and justice, to a knowledge ofl and respect for, 

: , relf-restraint aod self^ivemment, bat, to a rev- 

er. and %f» the exercise c^ force. Men who wrill. in 



TEE zxpzs'sE -srnx 5CT ?ij.r ZHiz szTotimC's:. 15 

CM-^'is, maltreat a lone, nr resisting cle^yrnxn. scii-^i-i-^eich/er, or 
"WO man, do n<j4 act under die indnence of reas-JiL hnman^ty. or 
re-.zard for legal rights. W^ _ . ire 

w..rse by nanire than C'dier i ^ _; . i ---J 

understand it, leads them to sustain slavery. a»d to sancJi";'© whai- 
ever is seen to be ne - :" r is si ?3- 

Daring all their lives : - l:<cen i:. . Me 

owners of slaves rise to wealth, rower and resp«e«sabiliiy. aifl 
their own ho c-es r-i'int in the s:. ' '^ as do 

th^ise oi a laborer ia a Free S j. fartn. 

Cheap negrties and the nmnterrnivted Bse of the-m. are the hrZ'pe 
f:»r which they are ~ . - aee rej i - — 

if sure of sueoess — : _ 

If slavery, having the ah6-:<liire e»:introI ot the State G-i-v^-a- 
inent* in the Slave States, L:. _ _ " 

there, deems, now. tiia: its : - - _ _ 

nienl specially adapted and devoted to ie pfoceet. ^^^Ti- 

ation. if it ree _ " - " ~ . ■ "^ , -^3_ 

vide such a g<: - _ iS 

such. — what shall pn?vent slavery ftoca destrxT'yiHg oar presen; 
<: t. and e:^ :' -' _ ' a nati^iii] g>3vei»- 

u, ■.■-._ :ed to its :," ^- ^ - . - 

Before answering this questioa. directly, we wiH nrsi iiii:cJi.te 
what, in onr oy" ' '"-•"' ■ ■ - 

TTe have sL. ■ . . " Stares will boc. 

cnaided. prevent it. throogh the aettoa irf^ their Sta:» govemraents 

the accomplishment of its revolutionary parposes*, ami dia: no 
react: ccary iniuences a" j ' : pe^:ple there, can reasoaaMy ^■e 

relied on. to arrest the ; - . . r:gKss \X events. 

Ooosid^ratiocs of economy — the pecuniary tsiri^os. taxes aad 
expenses of the r: ' " - - .rrest its _ - Ti* 

habits of thought a - v States, - ->C 

are nvt like those of the people c>t' ti»e Xocchefn, Easte-m aad 

Middle States. Such ^ -^■-\--- ^ .— : - - ; , .-d 

calculations 'n regarvl :. - . .-^ 

fon? it is not rv^asonable to expoct tliem to ind-^xence. so decidedly, 
•''cir public actioti. Moo^ver. tiie aerial p^rcur •— •:---- - 



20 THE PKOFITS OF SLAVERY. 

slavery are so great as really and reasonably to warrant, (those 
profits only considered), a large expenditure for its security. We 
give some statistics : 

Col. Woodson, speaking in Charleston, S. C, concerning Kansas, 

in March, 1S56, said : 

"Slaves ^ere worth $1500 each. Upon the above estimates their annnal products 
would reach $910 each, which would give 10 per cent, on the investment, $100 for 
food and clothing, and $505 clear profit to each hand.'' 

About the same time, a writer in a Florida paper gives, as an 
instance, 

•• One planter who works twentv-seven field-hands, counting girls and boys twelve 
years old with which he nins twelve plows and plants 250 acres of Sea Island cotton 
and 175 acres of com. We suppose it takes the com to feed the mules and ' people, 
and we suppose the cotton will vield 300 pounds per acre: that it is worth 2o cents 
per pound, making $1S,T50 for the earnings of 27 slaves, counlingboys and gu-ls over 
twelve years old." 

These profits are not so large as some that we have seen stated 
on apparentlv crood authority, and connected with other branches 
of slave labor."" We see that the pecuniary value of 4,000,000 
slaves, at $500 each, is $2,000,000,000. 

The Secretarv of the Treasury of South Carolina lately estimated 
the taxable property in that State, thus^ Slaves, $270,000,000 ; 
land. $105,000,000 ; all other property, $73,000,000. 

Slavery is certainlv an enormous pecuniary interest, and there- 
fore large sacrifices 'can be afl:brded, for what that interest may 
be supposed to require. 

We are not speaking of the general interest of the whole people, 
in the Slave States, but only of the pecuniary interest of slavery— 
the rulino; power. Despotisms and oligarchies are generally 
exceedin^lv unprofitable to the people, but they are not unprofit- 
able to tile rulei^ themselves, and therefore they are never relin- 
quished by those rulers, from prudential reasons. The House of 
Hapsburs; have flourished, though the nation suflered. Delirant 
reges, pUdimiur AcJdvi. The ambitious political men, who now 
control, in those States, are reckless of expense ; their necessities 
reqnire them to go on. and probably they may be pecuniarily and 
largely benefited, though the people and the country should be 
ruined thereby. Equally reckless are the poor masses, who have 
nothing to loose, and think they have much to hope from the rev- 



: '3X" t v^ t vt.'i-'e yx ;.!_ 



fl 






. _ -re aoe iio-sr faille ire vay expectatkos tiiat 
tiie r«»"c»iuii'-'ii is now to l>e arret^tc- : 

bowever great maT be tbe re*-. Ic«s — - - 

pe»?ple or the nation tiiei>el>j". 

liie low Southern taris nii/i:. aowcTer. ' - - 

at the same time -withdraw !N'orthera tr.. ~ , * 

revolar'onarr exchequer, and, thrv-kogh this means. seee^i».-«a, in- 
stead of entailing a di- - g expense, might n?allr biing 
pecnniaiv prc'f.t and en: . -: -■— - - - -it- 
Interference hv other nations will not parent the coosi^mraa- 
tion of the revolution. Less than foraierlr are European natioois 
inclined to interf^^, to prevent revolutions, even on their owu 
continent : and their motives to do so are less here, espeviallr 
when, as in this case, Ae piv->po?ed revoluticfli is anti-popular, and 
favorable to aristCKr-racy— perhay^ to an empire, rnfoitnnatelv, 
also, the promised policy of the preposed government, is reallv 
more friendly to their mercantile intei>ests, than that of our present 
govemraent" and, in this r^^pect, wiser for all t>^ncerned. That 
European nations will r^x>gnize, and negotiate with, the "* South- 
em C<»nfederacy " or Empire, if it is pennitted to become a 
national sovemment ih/iWfo, no one can rationally refuse to Iv- 
lieve- Europe has no such interest in the pr>?serYation or ivstora- 
tion of our present national govenunent, as we ourselves have ; 
and, if we acquiesce in its dismemberment and tlie establishment 
of another, rival, and, prol^bly, hostile government, on our own 
borders, and even out of our own territory, how exceodiugly 
pusillanimous and absurd it is to calculate th,^t Eurv>iV will, to 
discourage slavery, and out vf a gt^noral regard lor hum.^iity, veto 
the rising government, and tlius do for us what we will not do 
for ourselves ! Europe has not extinguishtxl Turkey. Siviin. Or.lw 
or Brazil. 

Returning affection for the Union, in the Slave States, will not 
Ptav the revolution. Were it sufficient for this, the revolution so 
long contemplated, would never have Wen Ivgun. Neither is 
'• returning reason" of those people, to be relied on. Their revol- 
utionary movement is no temjx>n\ry excitement, but is tlie 



loirical result of sentiments and purposes lons^ entertained and 
deliberately pondered. " Eeturnin^ reason" may, however, do 
good, in at last showing loyal people how to meet the revolu- 
tionists. 

National considerations — the sense of secnrity, and ])ride in 
being part of a great and powerful nation — will not suffice to 
restore the disaffected. This generation of our people have grown 
up with this sense of security so strong, tliat it seems to them to 
be personal, rather than national, and nothing, perhaps, but a re- 
versed experience, can teach them its source and its value. Be- 
sides, if a rcA^olution can be so easily and suddenly accom- 
plished, it may seem that onr sense of security was fallacious, and 
that our national government has not really deserved the confi- 
dence and respect it has enjoyed. TTe cannot shut our eyes, too, 
to the fact that to the southward over the whole Continent, are 
rich countries and weak governments inviting to conquest, and 
that the rivalries, and perhaps hostilities, M'ith the "Northern 
Republic," may afford are agreeable stimulus to those sentiments 
of patriotism, which delight to express themselves in action. 
Looking at this subject, too, from a Southern point of view, as 
we are now doing, it is not, perhaps, unreasonable to contemplate 
the gradual and ultimate absorption of all the States into the 
more plucky and daring, and therefore successful, government, 
which it is proposed, by means of the revolution, to inaugurate. 

Conciliating the border Slave States, b}-- concessions to slavery, 
will not win back the seceding States, but must, while the separ- 
ation continues, demoralize the Free States. The most vicious 
and corrupting influence in our politics is, " the balance of 
power," or "third party." Only in respect to the slave trade, 
are the interests of slavery, in the border Slave States, different 
from its interests in the more Southern States. The border 
Slave States have probably secured, by their position, the guaranty 
in the Constitution of the " Sonthern Confederacy " against the 
opening of the foreign slave trade. It cannot be doubted that, on 
the same principle, favorable guarantees will be obtained by them 
from the Free States. A slave confederacy being permitted on 
one side of them, ever solicitous for their alliance, and the exam- 
ple of successful secession being before them, nothing but con- 
stant acquiescence in their wishes, assiduous cultivation of their 
interests, and a liberal share of the benefits and emoluments ol 



NOR DEKAD OF INSUKRECTION. 23 

government, could retain them in the Union. Tlie system of 
''coniju'omise" M'ould become perpetual, and more one-sided 
than ever. Soon, perhaps, the " Northern Free Confederacy " 
would thus become more theoretically and governmentally pro- 
slavery, than the "Southern Slave Confederacy." What, then, 
should prevent the union of the two confederacies — in, short, re- 
construction of the Union on the slavery basis ? The same result 
would also be attained by a general compromise, satisfactory to 
slavery. 

Such seems the prospect before us, on the principle of concili- 
ating the horder Slave States. If we refuse to do so, or if we show 
ourselves, in their estimation, at all niggardly, in our concessions 
in favor of slavery, they join the new national government to be 
established for slavery, and find there, that which politicians have, 
for years, been educating them to consider a sine qua no7i — protec- 
tion for slavery. For we must not suppose that the interests of 
slavery are really and greatly inconsistent in the slave-raising and 
the slave-consuming States. The owner of a gang of slaves in 
Georgia has as much benefit from the monopoly caused by pro- 
hibiting the foreign slave trade, as the owner of a large family of 
slaves in Virginia; and the non-slaveholders in Yirginia might 
be nearly as much benefited by the cheapening of slaves, through 
the restoration of the foreign slave trade, as the non-slaveholder 
of Georgia. Not those who have slaves, anywhere, but those who 
want them everywhere, would be benefited. 

While actual slaveholders control the "Southern Confederacy" 
it will probably not open the slave trade, however favorable they 
may be to free trade in articles which they have not. A "slave 
Republic" might, and indeed ought, logicall}-, to open this trade; 
but a slave oligarchy or despotism would be more likely to con- 
nive at it, as in Cuba and Brazil. 

Dread of servile insurrection will not stay the revolution. Ulti- 
mately these will certainly come, if slavery has its way ; and in 
case of a general war, they may, indeed, burst out speedily, and, 
like the burning barracks in Fort Sumter, slavery may thus 
smother its defenders. But dread of this, is not yet imminent in 
the Slave States. It is the custom there, to attribute insurrections 
to " northern abolitionists," rather than to man's inherent desire 
for libert}^ ; and the exclusion of northern men, and extensive 
military preparations, create, probably now, a sense of increased 



24: NOR CONSCIOUS INABILITY. 

secnrity from insurrections, except, perhaps, along the borders of 

tlie Free States. o. . . 

Moreover, it is not easy for people bred in the Free States to 
realize the mastery whicli strong wills exert over strong men bred 
to unconditional submission. That free negroes make good sol- 
diers, was shown by the colored regiments which did good service 
in our war for independence ; but it is not the least of the terrible 
afflictions of slavery, that it so far destroys manhood. It was one 
of the mistakes of John Br^wn, that he c-alculated on the prompt 
aid of those whom he meant to assist. The terrible penalties sure 
to fall on resistance, the difficulty of combination and organiza- 
tion by slaves, the facilities for them on the part of the whites, 
the investigation by torture, the certainty of exposure, through 
some avenue for strong personal affections, and the unvarying 
character of experience, make slave insurrections very rare, always 
of limited extent, and speedily suppressed. Indeed, it may rea- 
sonably be supposed that sucli experience, in this direction, as the 
covernins class, in the Slave States, have had, has strengthened, 
ratiier than diminished, their self-confidence. Apprehensions of 
their inability to create and maintain independent government, 
if they exist at all, do not arise from within. 

Judi^ins, also, with unprejudiced eyes, tlie prospect that, if our 
government permits, the revolutionists can not only maintain 
an independent national government, but greatly extend and 
strengthen it, justifies the confidence they express. The experi- 
ment^'of the few governing the many, by military rule, is neither 
new nor unsuccessful. In many respects the conditions are exceed- 
ingly favorable for it now, in the Slave States. The proclivity of 
their educated men, for political employment, is proverbial. It 
lias been indulged and cultivated for generations, by our general 
^fwermnent. Our military and naval schools have, also, been 
most freely and extensively used by them. The degradation of 
labor, by means of slavery, has caused a large body of poor whites 
to grow up in idleness, and fitted for nothing so well as to be con- 
vened into soldiers. Organization, the great element of power 
among civilized men, is easier accomplished among a few, and 
under the consolidating pressure of a strong common interest. 
Southward, indefinitely, are rich countries with weak govern- 
ments, and adapted to the evident purposes of the revolutionists, 
the acquisition of which would give employment to the ambitious 



GEEATKR FOKCE WILL AVAIL. 25 

and restless, and, at the same time, consolidate and extend their 
national power. 

Waiting for something to turn np, will not stop the revolution. 
We have waited — waited astonishingly — and still the revolution 
went on. Yery naturally and very regularly it went on. Its 
conductors have evidently been in earnest, and working with a 
purpose and a plan. Does a falling body arrest itself? Neither 
will slavery arrest itself— especially if rushing, unresisted, towards 
a long-cherished purpose. 

What will stop it, and the revolution which it has initiated? — 
again we ask, and now we answer,— ^o/r^, greater force^ nothing 
but a greater force. 

With conscious anxiety, slavery has, from the beginning, pro- 
tested against force ; and its friends and allies, everywhere catcli- 
ing at the word, have promptly echoed '''•no coercion;'^'' and the 
politicians, accustomed to receive the law from slavery, flying 
to "compromise," their favorite panacea, and producing each 
his separate plan, have, nevertheless, shaken their lieads with 
wonderful unanimity, enjoining peace., jpeace^ '•'' no coercion.^'' It 
is one of the shrewdest of all the devices of slavery, thus to im- 
pose on tlie people of a great, strong nation, a pre-determination 
not to use the only remedy v)Mch slavery really dreads. Slavery 
originates in force, it believes in force, it relies upon force, and it 
only stays its hand where greater force is met or expected. Hav- 
ing determined on revolution, it naturally guarded most, against 
the use of wdiat it knew w^ould be the most effective preventive. 
Pretexts were of course needed, and were used liberally. Failure 
to deliver up escaped slaves, personal liberty laws, exclusion from 
the territories, (fee, &c., were much talked of; but, that they were 
only pretexts, was shown by the steady, and even accelerated, on- 
ward progress of the revolution, while Congress, in alarm, was 
appointing committees, and politicians and parties were vieing 
with each other, in alacrity, to devise remedies for the pretended 
grievances. And yet, through the whole, and while the revolu- 
tion was advancing with its utmost speed, through State after 
State, while emissaries (we may not call them conspirators, for 
they acted openly,) were freely and frequently passing to and 
fro, negotiating not only with State, but with Federal authorities, 
cultivating, preparing and forwarding the revolution, in every 
possible manner, and with the greatest possible haste, — wdiile 



26 OUR SYSTEM NOT DEFECTIVE. 

arms, public moneys, forts, vessels, and armies were seized every- 
where, except where strong resistance was expected, this great, 
strong, rich, and courageous nation was, while its own dissolution 
and destruction were progressing, magnetized into quiescence, by 
the constant warning and threat, that resistance would pre cijntate 
the revolution ! Force, our rightful constitutional, national /orci?, 
and that only, would have stopped it, at any point hitherto — will 
stop it now. 

The extensive general powers of our State governments favor 
such a revolution, mdess our National government act in its 
appropriate sphere. It only needs that State governments should 
assume national powers, and the General Government acquiesce in 
snch assumption, and the revolution is accomplished. But it is per- 
fectly easy, always, for our General Government to exercise its 
national functions ; as easy, at least, as for any other national 
government to exercise such. When it does not exercise them, 
no defect is chargable upon our system. The whole blame, in 
such case, is chargable upon its administration, and not upon its 
founders. The wit of man could not devise a national government 
that will go of itself. With an imbecile Executive, the strong- 
est national government becomes imbecile. 

It is not proposed, to present here, a plan of operations for our 
Government, much less, to enter into details. We are treating of 
principles — endeavoring to trace, to their logical consequences, 
conceded fticts, and known political forces — human interests, 
prejudices, passions and ambitions. But we will suggest, in 
passing, that, in our judgment, it is not so material wdiat partic- 
ular position we shall first defend, as it is, that we immediately 
cease to acquiesce in rebellion, and defend, with a strong hand, 
and unfaltering determination, our national existence and rio:hts. 
Fortunately our system of government is such, that vindication 
of its national authority, does not require the overrunning of 
the States with armies. Most of the functions of government 
are, at all times, left to the States, to be there exercised, inde- 
pendently of the General Government. With these, the General 
Government has no occasion to concern itself directly, but only 
(when called on for the purpose) to maintain the rightful authority 
over them, of the State governments. With other national gov- 
ernments this is not so, and a rebellion arising, anywhere, under 
them, must be overcome in detail, as well as in general. But if 



OUR GOVERN.MKNT WILL BE MAINTAIXKD, 27 

the nature of our goveniinental system tlins excuses us from tlie 
necessity of overrunnincr, with armies, tlie States Avhere the 
authority of the General Government is denied, it does not excuse 
us, but, on tlie CDutrury, imposes, if possible, a stronger obliiration 
on tlie General Government, to maintain its own few and sfmple, 
but most important rights, and to resist and punish their usurpa- 
tion. And we are sure it will still be found, as, tlius far in our 
history, it always has been found, that this division of duties 
between the State governments and the General Government, 
derogates not at all from the power and efficiency of tlie latter,' 
but makes it, for its proper, constitutional, and general purposes' 
tAe stro7igcst and most efficient national government in the world. 

Suppose then, that our General Government, speaking and 
acting through the men who, clothed with its authority, have the 
right and duty to speak and act in its name, determines, as it seems 
at length to have done, that in no possible event, will it acquiesce 
in usurpation, and suffer its own dissolution to even begin ; but 
will, to the full extent of the nation's power, vindicate^ against 
enemies at home, as it cannot be doubted it would, against en'emies 
abroad, its right and its duty to exist, to lltmrish unscathed, and 
to progress, as it has, and as the Others meant it should, now and 
forever. And suppose it manifests such determination, by such 
immediate ])reparation as the exigencies of the ease require,— 
taking special care, by the liberal use of its resources, to guard 
against any failure in the exercise of its power; and, if need be, 
that it exercise that power, unflinchingly and firmly. Can reason- 
able men doubt the result? Can it possibly be doubted that the 
final result will be, the maintenance of our Constitution — our 
Government — «.s it isf If there be such doubt in this case, 
then when, in the possible course of human events, can an occa- 
sion arrise, when the right can maintain itself, airainst the wrono;? 
Bat let us consider calmly the possible consequences. We will 
suppose, first, that the worst that has been threatened, should 
actually occur, and, that the Slave States, all of them, rush, at 
once, into civil war. How will the case stand, and how M-ill it 
appear l)efore the world, and in the thoughts of the people every- 
where? The General Government, the government de facto \t 
de jure, with its written constitution vindicating its course, is 
right in law and in morals, and has the universtil sympathy of 

• 



28 WAK IS BETTER THAN REVOLUTION. 

humanity, and the hearty approval of all nations. It has, too, 
immense superiority in numbers, in wealth, in ships, and in all 
the resources of war. Its opponents are destitute both of justifi- 
cation and of means, and can get no help. They will fight hope- 
lessly /or slavery. There can be but one possible result, — the 
riglit will certainly prevail, and the wrong be compelled to yield. 
But " blood will flow and men will be killed !" True, but there 
are worse possible things than this ; to wit, national degradation, 
loss of lioerty, submission to slavery. 

" Woe to the land thou tramplest o'er, 
Death-dealing Fiend of War ! " 

But precisely because war is terrible, and peace most desirable, 
is it the solemn duty of this nation to defend itself against im- 
pending dissolution. He has read history wnth little profit, who 
does not know that the* establishment of a filibustering slave-gov- 
ernment, with national power, on the Gulf of Mexico is, in and 
of itself, a standing declaration of war ; wars for our own cur- 
tailed and miserable national existence, — wars, too, in which Euro- 
pean nations will ultimately participate, — wars, the final result of 
which no man is now wise enough to foretell, but in regard to 
which, every man should now be wise enough to know, that years 
of strife, thousands of lives, and millions of money, if necessary, 
expended now, in sustaining our present republican system, would 
be far the most economical and humane. We can think of no 
one advantage likely to result from a selfish and cowardly acqui- 
esence now, in our national dissolution; for the difiiculties and 
wars sure to follow, woidd come so soon, in these fast times, that 
very few of the fogies who would now compromise, would escape, 
through age, liability to military service, from which they are not 
already exempt. The trials and tribulations would not even be 
cast upon posterity. 

Having contemplated the worst possible view, let us now con- 
sider one, more correspondent to probabilities.* Our government 
has shown itself exceedingly lenient, forbearing, peace-loving — 
not to say timid, vacillating, weak. Tlie second ofticer in the new 

* This was written previous to April 15 ; events transpiring since, may cause it to 
seem less timely, but the prineiples remain, thou|;h the facts to which they are ap- 
plied, be changed or modified. 



SLAVERY MAY PAUSE. 29 

" Confederacv," congratulating a large audience, lately, at Sa- 
vannah, Georgia, on the successful progress of the revolution, 
said : 

"I take this occasion to state tliat I was not without grave and serious apprehen- 
sions that, if the worst came to the worst, and cutting loose ft-om the old government 
would be the only remedy for our safety and security, it would be attended with much 
more serious ills than it has been as yet" 

Yet, forbearing, and even accommodating as onr government 
has been, nevertheless, wherever and whenever it has been firm, 
slavery and its revolution have been stayed. It has attacked, 
where there was no resistance, and waited long, where the resist- 
ance was small. We think the inference reasonable, that, in view 
of such decisive determination and preparation by our govern- 
ment, as Las been indicated, slavery and its revolution will, ere 
long, everywhere, pause ; that peace, and not war, may be the re- 
sult, and national salvation, not only, but the lives of the people, 
be secured. We think that slavery has not expected such action 
of our e:eneral government, and that this, more than anvthing 
else, has encouraged its attempted revolution. 

The border Slave States, having the alternative, at once and 
distinctly, placed before them, will, we think, be less likely, to 
rush into a violent defence of the wrong and weak side, against 
the right and strong side, than they would be, to be drawn, by 
half-way measures, first into controversy, and then into false 
positions, and thus become committed to a course ending in hos- 
tilities. 

We are aware that the balanced state of afi^ilrs was, in some 
respects, exceedingly favorable to the border Slave States, that 
it gave them great political importance, and that nothing could 
be more desirable to the managing politicians in those States, than 
its indefinite continuance; but such is not really the interest of 
the people of those States. To them, as to the people of all 
the States, it is far more important, that the state of doubtful 
anxiety should be terminated ; and we doubt not, that, in view of 
such determination and preparation by our government, could 
the question be fairly presented to the people of those States, 
they would, by overwhelming majorities, determine to maintain 
the government as it is, and refuse to engage in rebellion. Those 
States have been in the anamolous position of trying to do both. 
Pressed to the alternative, we think they will choose the former. 



30 IN ANY EVENT, FIRMNESS IS BEST. 

AVe have already explained, however, that, as a rule, in all the 
Slave States, slavery controls the State government, but checked, 
more or less, in the degree of its absolutism, by popular influ- 
ences ; that isj by republicanism. The controversy whicli has, 
perhaps, generally been supposed to refer to South and North, 
exists, in reality, in every Slave State, between republicanism 
and slavery; as much within the State lines of Virginia, as 
anywhere in our country. "We think, also, that slavery under 
stands this, dreads it, and that here, is its chief cause of anxiety ; 
— that its greatest apprehensions, are from the people of its own 
States, from the spread and influence of republicanism, and the 
nltimate action of its own State governments, and not from any 
apprehended action of the general government; and we think, 
too, that the people of those States, the other party in the coming, 
though, pei-haps, still distant contest there, are not so well aware, 
as slavery is, of the inherent antagonism between them and slav- 
ery. We therefore do not coiLsider it certain, that slavery will 
not, in some, perhaps most, of the border Slave States, attempt, 
if circumstances should favor, to carry out its threat of " precipi- 
tating the revolution." Yet we know that slavery, however de- 
fiant and blustering, and apparently, reckless, is necessarily timid 
and cautious ; and we therefore have strong hopes, that, in view 
of such determination and preparation by our government, (would 
that they had. been earlier exhibited), slavery, in these States, will 
wisely determine to accept the continued sway of our govern- 
ment as it is, together with such lease of its own existence and 
])Ower, as the several State governments and their people may 
choose to give. 

A more dangerous element, in determining the course of these 
States, will be their ambitious politicians. These may be desper- 
ate enough for the plunge ; for they have been nursed into facti- 
tious importance. But politicians, too, are timid — verv timid 
and our government is strong — very strong, and its friendship 
better, even for a politician, than its hostility. 

Public opinion, the common sense of the people, may have a 
preponderating influence in these States ; and its influence will 
be greater, the naked question — support of our government, or 
rebellion? — being at once presented, and without altenative. 
than if it were farther complicated by political manceuverings and 
delny. 



TO DO RIonT, IS MOST EXPELIENT. 31 

Sticli we think a rational view of i^rohabilities. But we desire, 
here, to insist, that, for nations, as for individuals, it is not well 
to determine our course exclusively by reference to consequences, 
or—what is all that we can get in that direction— by our ext'nnate 
of consequences. Man's estimate of consequences is unreliable 
at the best; but an all-wise Providence rules the world, and 
where the right lies plain before us, as we think, in this case, it 
does, it would be assuming too large a risk, to attempt to com]>ro- 
mise it, in order to accommodate our views of consequences " Do 
right though the heavens fall," is a good rule, not because the 
heavens fall thereby, but l^ecause they do not,— because the God- 
established relation between' right action and good results, is 
found, by practical experience, to be safer as a guide, than man's 
judgment of consequences. We believe that an^infidel aj.iorelien- 
sion of danger to result from the doing of political duty, has 
brought us into our greatest national danger, and that, an' im- 
mediate and trustful performance of that duty, will do most to 
extricate us. 

Looking calinly at the greatest dangers foretold by the timid, 
looking rationally at probabilities, or looking simply at the duties 
plainly before us in the way of administering our government 
according to its constitution and laws, we can arrive at but one 
conclusion, satisfactory to reason, or at all becoming a great, wise, 
free. God-fearing, and man-loving people, or accordant with our 
past history, or with our professed confidence in the government 
of our choice ; and that is, for our government to go strongly and 
confidently forward, as it has for seventy years, leaving those who 
may attempt to oppose it, whoever or wherever they may be, to 
go down before a necessity of the age, infinitely greater and 
stronger than any which they can pretend to represent. 
^ The duty of this people and of this nation in this crisis, cannot 
innocently be evaded. Considerations of immediate p^uniary 
thrift, desire for peace at any price, an overmastering horror of 
blood-shed, are no excuse for national dereliction ; and certainly 
our position in the world, and in the world's historv, will afford 
us no peculiar exemption now, but, on the contrary,"' they require 
us, by every consideration that can be addressed to a great nation, 
and to reasonable and brave men, to act, confidently and fear- 
lessly, the part assigned us. The American revolution was the 
beginning of a political system, the conduct of which is now iu 



32 SLAVERY IN THE STATES, NOT ATTACKED, 

our liauds, and its great and ultimate purposes are still unaccom- 
plished. How great and excellent a system it is, and also how it 
is fitted and expected to secure the public safety and happiness, 
are well shown in the clear language of Mr. Calhoun, quoted near 
the beginning of this essay. Republicanism in every State, the 
rational control, by the people, of their political affairs, undis- 
turbed by force or violence, with full sway for all moral influences, 
guaranteed by the general government, is the system which our 
fathers established, which the world has admired, and we have 
so long used and enjoyed, and of which, even Mr. Calhoun de- 
clared, "the Federal Constitution and Government will stand, 
more durable than brass, an everlasting monument of their wis- 
dom and patriotism." 

We have shown that this republican system is not in practical 
operation in the Slave States, that another system, hostile to re- 
publicanism, has usurped the political power in those States, that, 
aware of the antagonism between itself and our republican sys- 
tem, it has determined to seek its own preservation at the expense 
of a revolution that shall destroy our republican system. Per- 
formance of the duty which we have pointed out, of resisting this 
aggression promptly and with strong hands, if need be, to the ut- 
most of our national power and resources, prepares the way for 
the restoration of republicanism in every State in the Union ; thus 
securing the harmony of our system, and -complying with a fun- 
damental j^rovision of our Constitution. 

Slavery, as it existed in the States at the formation of our Con- 
stitution, is not to be attacked by our general government, how- 
ever great may be the provocation ; but slavery, organizing as a 
national power, and advancing to the overthi'ow of republicanism, 
and the destruction of our government, must be resisted and at- 
tacked, without hesitation and without compromise, by the gov- 
ernment which it would destroy. To say that it cannot live under 
our Constitution as it is, to say that it is in danger of extinction 
from the advancing power and influence of republicanism in the 
States, is no justification for its rebellion. It has no right to 
live a single moment, in any State in the Union, longer than 
it can live there, with repl^blicanism. Ours is a republican Union 
and Constitution ; not a slavery Union and Constitution. Ee- 
I ublicanism is guaranteed in every State ; slavery is not guaran- 



liUJ RKPU'iLICANlSM IIKVIVKD. 33 

teed in a single State ; and no administration of our general gov- 
ernment can, withont becoming forsworn, forego its dnty to pre- 
serve our republican system in every State. If, therefore, slavery 
is right, wlien it alleges tliat it cannot safely live under our repub- 
lican system of government — under our Constitution as it is, and 
in the same States with republicanism, then the time has come 
for it to prepare, becomingly, for its dissolution ; for republicanism 
must, certainly, live, and not die. 

Suppose that this be, in reality, the case — and Ave have already 
more than intimated our belief that it is — it strengthens, rather 
than weakens, the solemn obligations resting on our government 
and its administration, to maintain our system now, and to resist 
j'e volution, to the utmost of our national power. If slavery, in the 
Slave States, begins to feel the reins of power slipping in its 
palsied hands, how disastrous it would be for the republican 
people of those States, numbers of whom have watched, and 
waited, and struggled long, if, through the pusillanimity of our 
general government, slavery should be permitted to extort a 
new lease of power, by forcing on a revolution for this express 
purpose I 

If, as we have all learned, undoubtingly to believe, republican- 
ism be the best form of government for man, and our federative 
system the best practical form of republicanism, what precious 
hopes of the people, in the Slave States, and of the people who 
shall hereafter be in those States, in all time, what hopes, too, of 
tlie good and the free, everywhere, — aye, and of the oppressed, 
everywhere, depend, now, on the performance, by our general 
o;overnment, of its simple, constitutional duty ; the duty of self- 
preservation, and therein, the constitutional duty of guaranteeing; 
republicanism in every State I 

The revival of republicanism in the Slave States, will naturally, 
perhaps necessarily, follow tlie defeat of the revolution prepared 
and urged on by slavery ; and then, in those States, gag-law and 
Lynch-law. will give way to common-law, and statute-law, and 
vigilance committees be superceded by civil authorities. In the 
language of Mr, Calhoun: — "Violence and revolution or physi- 
cal force, as the means of change," will be " excluded " there, 
and the '■ doors " opened — "never again to be closed — for the 
free and full operation of all the moral elements in favor of 
change.'' "The liberty of the press — the freedom of speech and 
3 



34 NATIOXAL DKSTRrCTION, OR NATIOXAL SALVATION. 

debate — tlie trial liy jury — tlie privilege oi' /tahea.'t rorj'^fs — 
and the rig-lit of the people peaceably to assemble together and 
petition for a redress of grievances,'' ''put under the sacred o-nar- 
antee of the Federal Constitution, and secured to the citizens 
against the power, both of the Federal and State governments," 
will become real and practical — ''if the Federal Government 
shall do its duty under the guarantees of the Constitution, by thus 
promptly su]ipressing physical force as an element of change.*" 

Republicanism in the Free States also depends, probably, on 
the preservation of our national system. Our great, strong nation, 
has proved to be — M'liat it was intended — a ]HM-fect wall of 
defence, an overshadowing providence, for the exceedingly free 
and popular republicanism of the several States. It cannot pos- 
sibly be so in the tuture, certainly not to the extent it has been, 
if this great, strong Government shall now dissolve "like the 
baseless fabric of a vision." 

Permit the revolution which slavery has initiated, which it 
certainly intends, and will, as certainly accomplish, nnless it 
shall encounter a superior force, whether in five States or fifteen, 
and the power and prestige of the American Eepublic, arefiitally 
destroyed. The wise national measures of all our statesmen, as 
well of those who founded our government as of those who have 
enlarged and strengthened it. are. at once, rendered nugatory. 
The month of the Mississippi, the southern coast, our vast Pacific 
territory, and, perhaps, other important integral parts of our 
country, are lost to us ; and commercial restrictions and national 
dangers gather in upon us. with the rapidly contracting national 
size and strength, involving, most undoubtedly, in the near future, 
the goading necessity of using far greater force, to preserve even 
life, and a modicum of liberty, than will now be re(|uired to pre- 
serve the whole. 

But, say. with the authority of this great nation, to slavery and 
its revolution, '• thus far — no farther," and republicanism, renewed 
in it5 youth, smiles again, serene and secure, in every State. 
Slavery, yielding to a greater necessity, not only abandons its 
aspirations for distinct national embodiment, but retires from the 
field of our national politics, and shields itself, as it may, and as 
it was contented to do. previous to 1S4(». under the legislation of 
States, that are themselves protected from violence from without 
and from within, bv tlie o-reat and strouir government, whieli 



FREED FK03I THIS DAXGEB, VTE ADTAXCE. dO 

slavery, in its arrogaoce, has aspired to overthrow. There, and 
there onlj, can the problem which it present?, find a peaceful 
solution. What that solution may be, we will not assume to 
declare, but, th'at thus this problem may be solved, peacefully 
solved, our faith in man, and our trust in a Higher Power, will 
not permit us to doubt. 

In the meantime, our nation, released from its only internal 
danger, and exempt, as it long has been, from external dangers, 
may continue, with fresh impulse, its grand and happy career. 
It is a narrow view that limits our republican system tu its present 
l)0undarie3. TTe think it a narrow view, to limit it to Xorth 
America — perhaps it is too narrow, to limit it to th^ continent. 
The advantages resulting from perfect freedom of intercourse 
between the people of the several States, are such as cannot be 
secured under diverse national governments. One great source 
of our unexampled national prosperity, is in our exemption, 
among so many States, and of so varied climates and produc- 
tions, from ever\- kind and degree of governmental espionage and 
oljstrnction, in our exchanges of the fruits of our soil and industry. 
But the moral benefits thence resulting, are still greater, and alto- 
gether incalculable. It was not by an accident, that, in former 
language, siranyer meant enemy. Mutual interests, and mutuai 
knowledge of one another, make friends of men, and the national 
government that protects and enc<jurages such mutual intercourse, 
bec'ines the recognized benefactor of all. 

Governmental science, taught by examples in the several 
States, is als''> making, under our system, wonderful progi-ess. and 
is, in turn, both teaching and exemplifying the absurdity of the 
old dogma, that man is naturally the enemy of man, and is sub- 
stituting for it, the christian doctrine, " behold, all ye are breth- 
ren." Fnder such a system it is no unnatural development — 
however strange it may be. in the world's history — the national 
charity that fed thefamisliing poor in Ireland, that springs to the 
aid of suffering Kansas, and that even now. hastens to supply the 
hungry demands of the people, in Alabama and Mississippi. 
Such things ai-e the natural results of our republican system, a 
system more in accordance, than any that the world has before 
seen, with the songs of the angels, who declared ''peace on earth, 
and good will to men I "' 

And the improvements and discoveries of the age, those especi- 



3g GREAT ENTERPRISES AKE BEFORE US, 

ally relating to transportation for goods, for persons, and for 
thoughts — steamships, railroads, printing-presses, telegraphs — 
seem to be specially adapted to the expanding needs and capabil- 
ities of our grand republican system. Other governments might 
well dread the dangers of territorial expansion. With their sys- 
tems, and with their means of conducting them, national ambi- 
tion frequently outran their national ability. To the harmonious 
and efficient action of our system, national expansion scarcely 
seems to place, in these times, any assignable limits. To the 
exercise of the few, but most important functions of our General 
Government, space and distance scarcely present obstructions. 

Won by the observed harmony, large practical freedom, and 
perfect safety of the States in our system, other States will press 
into the charmed circle ; and, not by unwilling conquest, but by 
mutual beneficial arrangement, and as fast as development and 
adaptation permit, the regions north of us, to the Pole, and south 
of us, to the Isthmus, and even the rich Savannahs watered by 
the Amazon and the La Plata, may gladly and luippily congre- 
gate, by their representatives at Washington, and derive, fi'om the 
government founded by our fathers, assured protection, peace, 
and republican libertj»and independence. Thus we have, on this 
continent, " a congress of nations" for the peaceful adjustment of 
national questions. 

The genius of our people, extending with our institutions, M'iJl 
spread our improvements over the continent ; and all will parti- 
cipate in the benefits. Varieties of climate will minister, as they 
ought, to the people's health, wealth and happiness. Fresh fruits 
in ever}^ season, will be everywhere easily obtained. The tropics 
will be the hot-houses of the market gardens, for our northern 
cities, villages and towns ; and productions in the higher latitudes, 
so abundant as to be seemingly useless, wull minister gratefully to 
the languid dwellers nearer the equator. 

As our national power rises, expands and grows, enterprises, 
now seeming absurdly impracticable, or requiring the combined 
energies of great nations, will become easily practicable for our 
own. Pacific railroads, — not one or two, but all that our millions 
of people will require and sustain — will dart over the continent 
wherever needed, and with as much seeming ease, as the spider 
throws out its web on the breeze. A ship-canal across the Isth- 
mus, — not meandering circuitousl}' through valleys, and rising, 
by means of locks, over a summit level, but broad, level and 



IF THE REVOLUTION BE STOPPED. THE STATES FKEE. 37 

straight, under the ridge, from ocean to ocean — will transport the 
commerce of the world. "With such facilities, Oregon and Cali- 
fornia, Chili and Peru, will be nearer to our political and com- 
mercial centers, Washington and iNew-York, practically, and 
measuring by time, than was Xew-Orleans during the adminis- 
ti-atioii of Jeiferson. 

These, and perhaps still greater, and, as \et, unthought of 
enterprises, successfully accomplished, will attest our national 
power, and add to our national glory. Yet, /lof, if our National 
Government 'permits the revolution toga on, ichich slavery has he- 
gun j not, if it does not immediately and effectively use its 
national power, for national protection, and for a lasting warning 
to all, that no real success can attend here, violence, anarchy and 
rebellion. Using again the language of Mr. Calhoun, we say : 
" No people ever had so fair a start. All that is lacking is, that 
we shall understand, in all its great and beautiful proportions, the 
noble political structure reared by the wisdom and patriotism of 
our ancestors, and to have the virtue and tlio sense to preserve and 
protect it." 

Certain supposed obstacles deserve, perhaps, a passing notice. 
It is said that the States which have " seceded •' will never humble 
themselves by submission. We have failed entirely, in one of our 
chief purposes, if it does not sufficiently appear, that it is not 
properly the republican States of this Union that have engaged 
in revolution, but a power in antagonism to the republican people 
of those States, that has usurped political control, and wrongfully 
assumes now, to speak in the name of the people and of the 
States. Every indication is given by this power, that it is con- 
sciously a usurper. Precipitation, terror, violence, and not the 
sober second thought of the people, are what it relies on. The 
restoration of republican independence to these people and States, 
under the guarantees of the Constitution, and by tlie power of the 
Union, will not come to them in the shape of tyrannical subjuga- 
tion, but in the shape, rather, of real enfranchisement. 

In several of these States it is already known that a majority 
of the people, not only have not desired, but are actually opposed 
to the revolution forced on them by the usurping power. And it 
cannot be doubted that, in every State, with proper time for re- 
flection, and. fair opportunity for the action of those ^' great moral 
agents," S]'okeii of by Mr. Calhoun, the people wnuhl hold, with 



3S POLITICAL COXSKQFEXCES. 

gladness, in the Union, to their guaranteed satetv, treed. un and 
republicanism. 

The men who now lead on the revolntion in those States, will, 
it is true, be compelled to give way. But their humiliation in- 
volves no humiliation for their States. Other men in those States, 
good and true, will be found by their people, competent to lead 
in the wiser, safer and happier paths of union and peace. More- 
over, people easily forgive themselves, even when thev have 
erred. 

Certain it is, that, in every State, are great numbers of men, 
faithful to truth, duty and constitutional obligations; and not even 
an accidental majority against them, in their own States respect- 
ively, can absolve*our General Government from the sacred duty 
it owes, to sustain and vindicate them ; not indeed, by placing 
the State Governments in their hands, but by protecting their 
rights as minorities, in States in the Union. If the purpose of 
Constitutions be. as Mr. Calhoun says, to restrain majorities, cer- 
tainly our United States Constitution should now avail for the 
political salvation of our loyal people in every State. Impotent 
as these people are, in many of the Slave States, if unaided, yet, 
sustained by the general government, they may, by use of •* the 
moral agencies" guaranteed to them by the Constitution, restore 
to legitimate action, in their States, the republican principles of 
our system. 

"We have purposely avoided, as much as possible, in this expo- 
sition, the use of names, especially of living political men ; and 
gladly would we close, without reference to the political manipu- 
latoi"S and their combinations, throughout the Union. Really 
they ought not to intluence the opinions or actions of any body, 
in times like these. But. being the cause, both of unfounded 
hopes and of unfounded fears, we notice them, to protest against 
their mischievous imbecility. Earnest men are for earnest times, 
— men who believe in duty and in God, not men who believe in 
sham and the devil. Political parties, that survive revolutionary 
times, are not those whose chief end and aim it is. to nurse them- 
selves. The party that survives, is the one that finds the most 
useful work to do. In a crisis like this, when the fate of a conti- 
nent seems trembling in the balance, the petty interests and am- 
bitions of the pettA" men who flutter and buzz in the sunny day 
of prosperity, should not be iiermitted t<> usurp public attention. 



ONLY THK TRUE MEN TRUSTED HEKEAFTEK. 39 

Plans for the cc^nstruction or reconstruction of parties, are useless, 
and will be destitute of power to harm those who go boldly for- 
ward in the ]»erforniance of the duties which patriotism, the Con- 
stitution and the laws enjoin. 

But woe to the men, conspicuous or obscure, who oppose, or 
shrink, or equivocate, now ! Xothing can be more certain, nothing 
is more in accordance with human nature, nothing is more in ac- 
cordance with our past political liistory, than that the men who 
now sustain our republican government, wherever they may have 
been, or whatever called, heretofore, will be recognized, hereafter, 
as safe political guides, and safe depositories of political power; 
and that the men who now connive, in any manner whatever, 
at rebellion, or who hesitate or compromise, wherever they mav 
now stand, or whatever honored name they may now M'ear, will 
never outgrow their disgrace. Year by year. a«i the nation re- 
cedes from this time of its peril, clearer and clearer will become 
the universal consciousness of the broad distinction between 
the right and the wrong, as now presented before us ; and few, 
in the rising generation will, in a few years, have the charity to 
believe, that any who now take the wrong side, can possibly be 
good men. 

Apitir. 15. 1801. 



THE CRISIS : ITS RATIONALE. 



PART II.— RESTORATION OF LEGITIMATE AUTHORITY THE END 
AND OBJECT OF THE WAR. 



A year has passed since the foregoing pages were pnblislied. 
The public mind, then much tossed by conflicting counsels, needed 
clear ideas of the principles at work in the contest that was be- 
ginning — an understanding of the rationale of the crisis. Its 
magnitude and earnest reality were comprehended by few; the 
leaders of public action differed widely; consequently, a great 
and intelligent nation stood paralyzed with doubt, and only those 
1 landed fur rebellion seemed inspired and sustained by a definite 
l»ui'[)()se. It was time for action rather than for explanation; yet 
the great hindrance to effective action was the want of clear no- 
tions of the work to be done. Errors of opinion erected them- 
selves into real obstacles ; and plainly now does it appear that, 
in every stage of this crisis, our nation has been punished for these 
errors, too long unadvisedly or selfishly entertained. 

Clearer ideas of political duty now prevail, and the true men 
of the nation are more united by definite purpose. This is not 
merely because events have more and more lifted the veil, but it 
is also because tliey have co-inpelled the people to thinJc. The 
people of a republic must think, or they must fail. Earnest 
thought, inspiring earnest action, has done much to bear us 
through this crisis; yet the future is still before us. This is a 
great republic, it is the great republic, and it is ours — yours, 
reader, and mine. This trial of our reign is not yet fully past. Per- 
haps the most difficult-^- we hope not the most dangerous — ^Q;\-t 
is yet before us. Not for speculation, therefore, but for present 
and important use, let us consider further the rationale of this 
great crisis in our national life. 

Time has already done much to verify the princi23les, and, in 
fixct, every material proposition in the foregoing exposition ; in so 
much that a review and comparison with subsequent and actual 



42 OUR SLAVKKT 

event?, thouirh made for the purpose of establishing conviction, 
would' be liable to a diflereut construction. Such review and 
comparison are left for the reader to nuike, with the reminder 
that whatever of accuracy may thus appear, in what was written 
almost entirely before the attack on Fort Sumter, is attributable 
neither to prophetic gifts nor to lucky guessing, but simply to 
logical inferences from well-known political principles. 

Vhat shall follow is not intended as a repetition or mere enforce- 
ment of what precedes ; yet, being part of the same great subject, 
and intimatelv connected, the principles already established 
should be borne in mind. Thoughtful consideration may lead,^ 
not onlv to the formation of better opinions and the dismissal of 
needless apprehensions, but also to wiser and more elfective ac- 
tion. 

Acceptino- the admission which invariably connects slavery 
with the contest in which the country is engaged, we exposed, in 
the forci^oino- pages, the tallacy which treats slavery as geograph- 
ical and subject to the laws of political economy prevailing in 
free communities, and which assumes that it will die of its own 
accord ; and showed how the anti-republican system which it ne- 
cessitates in every Slave State, prevents the interests of the masses 
from working its abolishment through republicanism, anywhere, 
so long as the slave interest dominates the State ; that the princi- 
ples of slavery being inherent and characteristic, and ministering 
everywhere to the cupidity of the master, though ruinous to the 
State, are independent of climate and productions ; consequently, 
that the interest of the master, the pecuniary value of which is 
everywhere fairly measured by the price of slaves, will, in no cli- 
mate or country, cause slaveholders to abolish or discourage 
slaverv, or to establish or permit active republicanism. 

A kindred fallacy is that with which the people of this country 
have too long deluded themselves, namely : that our slavery is 
only African or negro slavery, and therefore less dangerous or 
more tolerable. 

Every vice or wickedness, public or private, seeks justification 
or palliation under the cover of some exception. Suppose the 
ne^ro be inferior, he is nevertheless a man, and endowed by his 
Creator Avith the rights of a man. Assumed inferiority, its co- 
relative of course being superiority, is the ground of all anti-re- 
publican governments and pretensions. Let republicans beware 



y-TT F*.*L SLIZ '.S 2i'7Z. 43 



ertv. ^: _ : :. r . z^ 

denial of . r. A~~ ^ 

riij i'. :i rigtits lo 

We ma's" not dcsirc. snd it tnaT qoj be "sri=p tioIt^t. to eleTate 
to the T, or tc .. or to 

marry. -: ^ ^ "•-..... ^ . . •?? «a 

EsT^T'tian : t~ mariT _ sesame 

ez - ■ ■ . , . - SzKiia 

Al_^.-.__ :^.--. .: ^-. .: :_^— :...^-. .:. -'7 »»<»» 

has a God-derive-l rizbt to hi? liberrr — to :o b>> e^bil- 

dren. to the nnits of fc:- 

obetructed bj - -- - ._._. 

<« his own me: 

Bet. c>:>mf>Ieic.v as lae c;_ _ _ 

ation. to justiiV our slavery. .. _: „.: ... _^ _. ; . ..i. _ : . 

inapplicable. Wliere tiie contro>of white ni«i i* abe-^-ute. and 
the condition ■:: _ - e« 

nnirersallv- in :_ - ::.- . -^ :„:..,. ._- :.... ._.-...:.- .: ,_..-. es 

must change ; not rapidly, perhaps, dnring the life of an icdivid- 
nal. but with great and accelerate*! rapidity, during the life oi a 
nation. Observation confirms what reason 5022^"- 

In 1S5«J the State of Kentucky C'Dntained 32,-i: ^*, and 

the State of Virginia 79.775 : there were, in all the Slave States, 
S4-.S74.* 

In the course of a few generations the proportion of African 
blood in these becomes very small, yet the ^atus continues. Eth- 
nology does not save the blood vf even the "superior race"' fn?ra 
bondage. 

The Richmond In/ptirer, in December, 1S55, said : 

" The l&ws of aH xhe soodieni Sates josdfy Ae i^iMiny of - - t tt. 

prOTided- thnxizh ihe raodier ibej are desc«jded. bowierer n - - j:iv» 

slave.~ - — the principle of slarerv is rigit and does not dej- . ^ of 
coniplexic<ii.~ 

• See. alsoi. - Sea Bosrd Slare Sates." p. 5M. eic on mixed races at Ne'w' Orie«a& 



44 ITS REAL ORIGIN. 

If tlie presumed inferiority of the negro were the real reason for 
0U7' slavery, then slaverj- should cease when tlie negro blood gives 
place to the boasted Anglo-Saxon. It does not cease in such 
cases ; but, on the contrary, becomes more valuable for the pur- 
poses of bondage, and is held to with greater tenacity. Shive- 
holders themselves no longer claim to justify mere negro slavery, 
but insist that slavery is the proper and normal condition of the 
laboring class, everywhere, whatever their origin or comj^lexion. 
And persons not slaveholders, even persons of standing and po- 
litical influence in the free States, have lent to the doctrine at least 
a negative acquiescence — sometimes even moi-e. A representa- 
tive man of the late dominant party, reared, petted and advanced 
by the free States, was conspicuous for having, throughout a pro- 
tracted political career, carefully abstained from connnendation 
of libert}^ as a principle ; and he even took pains to declare, in 
the Senate, that he cared not whether slavery was voted up or 
voted down ; and the declaration was made, not for the purpose 
of signalizing any peculiar or personal opinions, but, on the con- 
trary, to manifest his conservative moderation. 

A writer, also, in the North American Ileview did not hesitate 
to say, in 1853 : 

'' Slavery, therefore, exists rightftilly in the South. No rights of the negro are vio- 
lated when he is made a slave. His right, like that of all men, is to be governed for 
his own benefit. Some even go so far as to maintain that a social relation, founded 
on the same ]irinciples, and modified to suit different circumstances, a relation more 
strict than that of master and apjirentice, and le.«fl severe and permanent than that of 
slavery, might, with equal justice and much advantage, be introduced into some of 
the northei'n States in relation, not only to negroes, but to the swarms of emigrants 
who crowd our shores, many of them equally degraded by ignorance, poverty and 
vice, and equally needing care, guidance and government. Less liberty in them and 
more authority over them would be alike beneficial to themselves and, society." 

Selfish cupidity is the real cause and motive for slavery wher- 
ever it exists, and occasionally the admission is made with sufii- 
cient plainness to be understood. 

A leading southern paper alleged, five years ago : 

'• It is not hatred of slaverj-, it is not sympathy for the negro, which kindles the 
resentment and enthusiasm of the black republican party. It is envy of the ease and 
affluence of the southern gentlemen and jealousy of the aristocratic character of our 
social system which constitute the sentiment of abolitionism.'" 



WHAT IS SLAVERY? 45 

This allegation of motives reveals motives as 2)lain]y, perhaps, 
as the language lately quoted by a western corresj^ondent of a 
Boston paper: 

'■ This lady," says he, " coming from tlie north, loves slareiy for this reason, given 
in her own words : '0, the slaveholders are so independent and live so easy ! They 
can get rich in a few years, and there is no class in the world that can enjoy more 
than they.' " 

This brings us back to the old foundations. Our slavery rests 
on the same bad and selfish ])rinciples on Avhich slavery has al- 
ways rested ; the same principles, in fact, which liave gjjjven their 
support to aristocracy, to monarchy, and to every form of tyranny 
and despotism. That which divides us now is no abstract opinion 
about races, but it is slavery^ the oldest, the greatest, tlie worst, 
and the most dreaded political enemy of the human race. The 
issue between us is simply one of principle, fvpplying to man, 
rather than to a particular class of men ; and it reaches to the very 
form and nature of government. 

What is slavery? It is negation of self-control. It is the com- 
pulsory subjection of the fiiculties and powers of one human being 
to the control of another human being. It is necessarily social 
in its character, and pertains to order and to government ; but 
it is the lowest possible form of social order and government. The 
restraint to which it subjects a human being is ultimate in its 
degradation. It is not that to which a child or a lunatic is sub- 
jected, when reason is wanting, for in such case the good of the 
subject is the leading idea; but it is that to which we subject an 
animal. It is negation of the use of reason and of self-direction. It 
is the approjiriation of another's energies without reciprocity, the 
master's interest and will being the sole measure and guide. Its 
motive is cupidity, its argument force. In government it is most 
simple, and it is most absolute. Other modes of government 
have, or, at least, appear to have, i-eference to mutual benefits. 
The government of slavery is entirely one-sided. Its order, its 
regulations, its practices, originate and exist entirely in the mas- 
ter's interest and convenience. Even those which relate to the 
slave's comfort or enjoyment are measured and limited by the 
master's interest. Cupidity is the supreme arbiter on one side, 
entire submission the all-comprehensive duty en the otlier. 

The republicanism of this country is democratic, not aristo- 



46 SLAVERY NECESSARILY HOSTILE. 

cratic. Its fundamental principle is human rights — the rights of 
all, and not the rights of any special class as against others ; much 
less is it privilege. Sovei*eignty is of the people, and no man may 
rightfully claim what he will not also concede. It is impossible 
to conceive of any thing more irreconcilable than slavery and re- 
publicanism — such republicanism as we profess. Every princi- 
ple of the one is abhorrent to every principle of the other. They 
can not permanently coexist in the same country and under the 
same government. They could only coexist while slavery was 
regarded as an exception and in the process and preparation for 
removal. This is not matter of opinion, bnt of demonstration; 
for, as the philosopher eliminates with confidence all the elements 
of great and abstruse problems from given data, so may we Avith 
certainty infer, from the ^^rinciples of our republican system, the 
incompatibility of slavery, and hence its ultimate extinction. Our 
fathers expected and meant it should pass away from among us. 
We know tliis, not only from what they said, but from the essen- 
tial and inherent nature of the system they established. 

This is so, not only in its nature, and as our fathers saw it and 
intended to have it, but it is perfectly obvious, also, to the con- 
ductors of this rebellion, more obvious, pei'haps, to them, even, 
than to ourselves. The most of us have assumed the continuance 
and preservation of republican principles as matters of course, 
and have trusted too much, perhaps, to their unaided operation. 
Not so, however, with slaveholders and the political slave inter- 
est. They, not less than the founders of our government, under- 
stand the operation of causes and the logical sequence of effects, 
and with intellects sharpened by interest, they realize that slavery 
and republicanism are irreconcilable. Whenever, therefore, they 
resolved to Jiold on to slavery, they became, by inexorable logic, 
necessarihj Iwstile to rejpiiblicanism and to our republican system 
of government. They who could not or would not see this, have 
sometimes called them mad ; but patient observers of facts and 
principles must admit that their madness has a method in it, and 
consists only in believing, or at least determining, that slavery 
must be sustained. Grant this, and all else which thej' claim and 
do becomes reasonable and proper. It is precisely what any peo- 
ple should claim and do, if reasonable and consistent, in order to 
sustain the same principle. 

It was nothing special done by the believers in republicanism 



KEPUBLICANISM MUST PREVAIL. 47 

that alarmed the believers in slavery, and rendered them hostile. 
Pretexts subserved a purpose ; but the cause was the inherent 
nature and principles of republicanism and their embodiment and 
expression in our system of o;overnment — free schools, free 
speech, general suffrage, and social equality. 

Tiie Charleston Mercury^ in the spring of 1856, argued and 
showed, in a series of carefully prepared articles, that, whenever 
two hostile forms of civilization are associated in political union, 
one of them must inevitably be absorbed by the other, and that, 
under the Federal Constitution, the South must eventually be SM^al- 
lowed up by '* the North " — meaning, thereby, republicanism. 
It said : 

" If there be any phenomenon, which may be more clearly understood than any 
other which is presented by the development of civil society in the United States, it 
is this : that iht social system and civilhaiion of the Xorthand the northern method of 
thought, completely Europeanized as it is, icill predomimite in the American Union, 
if that Union lasts ,* aad Federal Government yielding to the pressure of that social 
system and method of thought, will, by the action of the representative body upon 
it, become, and in a great degree is now, merely the agent and instrument by which 
that predominance is to be accomplished. That the South is even now undergoing 
the process of absorption by the northern method of thought, in the manner stated 
by the above postulate or law, needs but a common sense observation to determine." 

This writer fully appreciated the necessities of the republican 
system, and denouncing, as traitors to the rights and interests of 
the South, those southern representatives who then consented to 
act in harmony with the North with a view to controlling the 
whole, he said : ^ 

" So far from the idea being true, upon which southern statesmanship founds its 
hopes, if the Federal Government were blotted out at a single blow, the method of 
northern thought would not be changed, the social system of the North would pro- 
gress as before, and a political system born of the joint action of both would be 
formed and controlled by them, to the subservience of all the ends they seek to ac- 
complish now by means of the Federal Government. But a good would result to the 
South by the fall of that government, for the present Union would be formed no more, 
and the South would thus cease to be under the blight and curse of a southern repre- 
sentation to a northern congress." 

An intelligent correspondent of the same paper, writing from 
Washington, January 11, 1857, says : 

" We can not hope for any other solution of this anti-slavery problem than the ulti- 
mate triumph of free soil over every department of government. All efforts at re- 
sistance will be as idle in the future as in the past. 

There are occasions in the history of nations, as well as of individuals, when extra- 



48 REBELLION A NATURAL RESULT. 

ordinary efforts are necessaiy to resist the effect of causes which may seem indirect, 
or even immaterial to the world at laige. The slave owners of the >-*outh find them- 
selves surrounded by elements which must end in their utter destruction, unless some 
great, determined and concerted effort is made in resistance." * * # ''Every 
effort of the South to escape from the thraldom will be dt^'emed revolutionary. It is 
the first and highest duty of the South to prepare to meet the issue thus presented to 
us boldly. South Carolina will be sustained if she accepts the conflict. To do so 
successfully, she must establish a policy looking to eventual indepeivlence. All the 
mere political expedients or party appliances will come to nought. The press of the 
State should coml)ine to develop that organization of individual sentiment which is 
necessary to practical effort." 

Understanding so well and so correctly the inconipatibility of 
repuljlicaiiisni with slavery, seeing and knowing that the differ- 
ence is radical and fundamental, yet, determiaed in every event 
to hold on to slavery^ what could the slaveholders and the politi- 
cal slave interest so rationally do, as deliberately, carefully, but 
determinedly, to revolt from a republican government? Under 
such circumstances, the thing itself had of course to be done, or 
at least attempted ; the remaining question being obviously only 
one of time and opportunity. And if it had to be done, or at- 
tempted, how conld reasoning men be expected to forego the nse 
of an occasion so peculiarly favorable as was afforded them by a 
series of remarkably acquiescent administrations of our general 
government — a series, too, that was evidently approaching its 
close? The real wonder is, not that they availed themselves of 
the opportunity, but that it was so wonderfully j^repared and 
offered to them. Not madly, and not foolishly, has the occasion 
been either chosen or used. The J,eaders of the rebellion have 
committed but one essential error. It consists simply m clinging 
to slavery — in saying to evil : " be thou my good." 

We would add that, on the question of expediency, they erred 
also in supposing that in this age and in this country, a reliellion 
against republicanism, for the express .purpose of establishing a 
government for slavery, could succeed ; but, witnessing the ready 
sympathy extended to them by rival governments anxious to attend 
the obsequies of republicanism, knowing, too, how many there are 
among ourselves who have learned to think that the slave interest 
must succeed in whatever it really undertakes, and who probably 
are still ready and willing to seek its favor, and understanding 
liow self-confident men become M'ho are self-assertive, we are con- 
strained to admit that, from their point of view, their scheme was 
far from appearing absurdly im])i-acticable. 



SLAVERY IS WRONG. 



49 



The great moral principle which lies at the foundation of this 
whole subject must not be overlooked. Slavery is wrong ; and 
the light which enlightens every man coming into the world en- 
ables dl to know itt The force of the truth ejnbodied in the 
golden rule is acknowledged, or at least in some degree felt, by 
every human beins ; and no perversity of educational influences, 
or repetition of sophistries, can completely blind any one to the 
inherent moral wrong of slavery ; much less can a whole people 
blind themselves to this truth. Slaveholders know that slavery 
is wrong, however they may pettifog with their consciences on 
the subfect, and use their interests as counselors. But the respon- 
sibility for seeking to pervert judgment concerning it rests hot 
with slaveholders only. Too long have our whole people been 
paltering with this subject, inventing euphemisms for it, and for- 
getting, in their selfishness, that God is just, and that righteous- 
ness — not wrong — exalteth a nation. 

The question, between the two sides in this case, refers to first 
principles. If slavery is right, then the rebellion is right ; be- 
cause it is necessary for the perpetuation of slavery.^ If slavery 
is wrong, then its supporters are wrong ; and have no right to rebel 
against republicanism and its government ; but they who defend 
them are right, and engaged in the cause of humanity and of God. 
It may be suggested that each side may think itself right. But 
it is not so. Moral distinctions are too plain fur such confusion. 
On questions for the intellect, and even on questions of fact, there 
is much room for honest differences of opinion ; but on moral 
questions it is 'diff'erent; and on questions so simple as that of 
slavery, the test is too easily applied to leave reasonable grounds 
for a plea of ignorance, especially in this age and country. 
Moreover, the right and the wrong on this subject have long ago 
been settled by the united testimony of the great and good of 
every age and clime. We say, unhesitatingly, therefore, that 
they who are engaged in this rebellion know instinctively that 
their cause is bad, and that the enlightened moral opinion of the 
world is against them. 

Hence their implacable hatred. Men determined to hold to a 
great wrong, and to defend it with strong hand, find it necessary 
to cultivate in every possible way all the savageness of their na- 
tures, are compelled to steel themselves against the promptings of 
humanity and to cultivate bitter hatred against those who oppose 



50 HENCE THE HATRED SHOWN. 

them. Were they to yield to the influences of brotherly kind- 
ness, their cause itself must immediately fail. 

Slavery can not meet republicanism on equal ground, but must 
answer with passion what it cannot answer with logic, and must 
make up for inherent weakness by remorseless violence. Con- 
sciously an aggressor and consciously in the wrong, it naturally 
hates those it injures. This has been so from the beginnmg, and 
the exhibitions of its hatred now witnessed with surprise, as cause- 
less, are but the results of its natural development. Its hatred 
extends to all who do not acknowledge it to be right, and coop- 
erate zealously and constantly to sustain it. It will not, because 
it safely can not, recognize degrees of approval. The history of 
all political men who, having begun to favor it, have anywhere 
hesitated or faltered, abmidantly illustrates this. The monitor 
within and the evident sentiments of mankind compel it to know 
that only interest, constant and strong personal interest, is to be 
trusted in its cause. Hence the efforts of many among us to con- 
ciliate its quick sense of hostility, by joining in denunciation of its 
more opeii opponents, find their fit illustration in the labors of 
Sisvphus rolling the stone. 

Were it possible really to believe slavery just, its champions, re- 
Ivino- on that inherent justice, would be more tolerant. Were 
they'' consciously right, they might, even though unsuccessful, 
conduct war with mairnanimity. As it is, tliey can only be 
boastfully " chivalrous," cruel and remorseless. The unities of the 
drlma in which they are engaged imperatively require them to 
be so. It is most natural, therefore, that the wftr should be be- 
gun and conducted, on their part, with treachery, and should be 
Attended by frequent exhibitions of malignity — that soldiers 
should be poisoned, the dead mutilated, graves desecrated, human 
bones used for trophies, and unarmed union men shot and hung. 
That the vindictive malignity of those engaged in the rebellion 
is due to their principles, and not to mere sectional hostility, is 
shown by their treatment of people of their own States. A late 
mimber of the Richmond Examiner, speaking of union men in 
Yirginia, says : 

"The most of them have pacTced up, ready to leave for Yankeedom at the shortest 
i,os.ible notice. In Braxton connty every tory has been shot by his neighbor, and 
in several other counties the citizens devoted to the confederate cause are domggood 
service in the same manner."' 



A NA'nONAL GOVERNMENT FOR SLAVERY. 51 

That cause is undoubtedly the cause of the bitterness which 
they exhibit, and in this fact appears the utter liopelessness of 
winning them to reconciliation by the exliibition of mere kindness. 
They know what republicanism requires of its friends, as well as 
what slavery requires of themselves ; and, therefore, even acqui- 
escence by the former in all the wishes and demands of the lat- 
ter would bring no real love or respect, but rather contempt. Too 
far, already, has such acquiescence been carried, for the peace and 
happiness of all. 

Were it the sole object of tins people to open the way for mu- 
tual kindness, there is no means so direct or effective as to put 
down the rebellion of slavery with strong hand and in the 
least possible time. The friends of republicanism must act as 
though they believed in it and loved it. The hated and despised 
must become feared and respected, before they can be loved. 

The necessities of slavery impose its character upon every part 
of this rebellion. It has been shown in the former part of this 
exposition that the social necessities of slavery require for it an 
anti-republican system, opposed to free speech, free thought and 
free action, and embodying the master's interest and will as the 
absolute law, in States dominated by the slave interest, even 
though organized under the forms of republicanism. What those 
same necessities would inevitably require in a government ex- 
pressly formed for their accommodation, is not difficult to fore- 
see. The world has seldom witnessed so effective and systema- 
tized deo^radation of the mass of human beino;s under a govern- 
ment, as such a system wouhl infiillibly produce. Men, it is true, 
are not always consistent; but facts, principles and history are 
terribly logical. 

The London Times^ ten years ago, made this correct statement 
of the principles on which the English Government is organized 
and conducted : 

" The institutions and customs of this country are all adapted to the supposition of 
a vast difference of classes, — a lower class, redundant, necessitous, ignorant and man- 
ageable ; an upper class, wealthy, exclusive, united and powerful ; and a middle 
class, struggling to emerge from the lower and attach itself to the upper." 

We see what moderate degree of general elevation such a sys- 
tem allows ; but wdiat could be hoj^ed for humanity under a sys- 



52 EKKORS AND OBSTEUCTIONS. 

tera in which the upper class would be wealthy, exclusive, united 
and powerful, with txoo lower classes, redundant, necessitous, ig- 
norant and manageable, but with no 7niddle or transitionary 
class ! Schools can not aid the poor whites to rise ; for education, 
except of the masters, is dangerous in a land of slaves, and there- 
fore must be discouraged, and even forbidden. There is no hope 
for them, except to become the armed watch.-dogs for slavery. The 
only accessions -to the upper class are immigrating fortune-seekers. 
The result, embodied in a national government, would, inevitably, 
be the ne jplus ultra of aristocratic selfishness and despotism. 

Against the principles and system thus threatening to establish 
themselves here, are necessarily arrayed, in deadly hostility, our 
national principles and system. Kepublicanism, liberty, and all 
that our fathers meant, when they declared themselves contend- 
ing for the rights of inan^ are now at stake. We are defending 
the system of government founded by our fathers, and which, 
for more than seventy years has, in every respect, save one, proved 
a miracle of success. We have deviated from its principles in 
administration, and hence, one of its normal results, the abolition 
of slavery, has been delayed, until slavery, instead of preparing 
for its dissolution, strengthens itself against the government and 
threatens its overthrow. Democratic republicanism is the essen- 
tial principle embodied in our governmental system, and this, 
we have shown, is hostile to slavery. Slavery is aware of it — 
hence, the rebellion. Slavery is wise, but slavery is wrong. Our 
D-overnment — and with it republicanism, which is its soul — must 

be sustained. 

Errors and obstructions have occurred in the administration of 
our government and in the political history of our peoj)le, which 
have caused many to misjudge as to the principles involved in 
this contest. An understanding of these errors and obstructions 
will make the true principles, and consequently our present du- 
ties, clearer now. 

Erroneously, an idea has prevailed that our constitutional sys- 
tem sustains slavery; and logically, the idea has been developed 
and wrought, until numbers among us transfer to slavery the rev- 
erence due to the Constitution. With a considerable class even 
the word " constitution " seems to mean slavery ; and hence, with 
them, to obey the Constitution is to sustain slavery. AYheuce 
this idea ? 



THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW. 



53 



It originated iii a perversion of a single provision of our Con- 
stitution, which, being unjustifiably made the subject of con- 
gressional legislation, has, like an unyielding foreign substance 
introduced into harmonious machinery, nearly caused the whole 
operations of our system to become jammed. Leading northern 
politicians in two great parties deemed it policy to sanction the 
legislation, and set themselves with industry to the task of recon- 
ciHng an unwilling people to propositions instinctively revolting. 
Wha't could not be done by logic, was attempted by iteration. 
Partizan feelings and vulgar prejudice helped the attempt. But, 
worst of all, it harmonized with the wishes, and possibly suggested 
the purpose, of the slave interest to pervert the great powers of 
the national government to the support of the inherently weak 
and tottering cause of slavery. Men who, to justify the fugitive 
slave law, had insisted, before the people, that the Constitution 
sanctions and protects slavery, and that such protection was one 
of the great purposes of the Constitution, could not well resist 
the logical application of the argument, when it was demanded 
by the slave interest, that the general government should, in otlier 
resjyects, also, extend and ^protect slavery. Their arguments re- 
turned to plague the inventors. What the ruling men of the Slave 
States most cared for, was this further use of the argument ; but 
some, even of these, condemned the obvious fallacy. 

The Charleston Mercury in 1855, said, of the fugitive slave 
law: 

'•It was, from the first, a miserable illusion ; and worse, in fact, for it was an in- 
fringement of one of the most cherished principles of the Constitution, which provides 
that fugitives from labor 'upon demand shall be delivered up,' but gives no power to 
Con-ress to act in this affair. The tenth amendment to the Constitution provides that 
'the° powers not delegated to the United States are reserved to the people.' The 
clause above confers no power, but is the naked declaration of a right ; and the power 
not being conferred, results to the States as one of the incidents of sovereignty too 
dear to be trusted to the general government. Our southern members strov-e for the 
passa-e of the law, and strove honestly ; but it shows the evils of our unfortunate 
condition, that in the urgency of our contest with an aggressive adversary, we lose 
the landmarks of principle- to obtain an illusive triumph, we pressed the government 
to assume a power not conferred by the instrument of its creation, and to estabhsh a 
precedent by which, in all after time, it will be authorized to assume whatever right 
may have no constitutional organ of enforcement." 

But politicians who strove to pervert the general government 
to the support of slavery, and others, more logical, like the edit- 



54: SLAVEKY NOT CONSTITUTIONAL. 

ors of the Mercury^ who early appreciated its utter incompati- 
bility with slavery, and yet held to slavery and advocated dis- 
union, naturally came together, when the purposes of the former 
class had failed, and when republicanism was obviously about to 
resume its rightful sway in the conduct of our government. 
Probably the rebellion developed more successfully, and gath- 
ered more friends to its support, than if ail who labored in its 
interest, had, from the beginning, adopted the logical conclusions 
of the Mercury. 

We have not yet outlived the generation of politicians among 
us who, to keep the road to preferment open before them, sub- 
stantially adopted, in both of the then great parties, the Shibbo- 
leth that the Constitution 7neans Slavery. Many, even now, seem 
to hope for political salvation by its repetition. They who think 
there is any truth in the idea should reexamine the Constitution, 
no|^in the false light of this doctrine, but in the clear light of the 
doctrine by which the Constitution was made — the doctrine of 
the rigJits of man. The unprejudiced and logical examiner will 
find there no sanction for slavery ; much less will he find em- 
bodied provisions there for its protection and perpetuation. Men 
and States that permitted slavery were, indeed, by the Constitu- 
tion, bound together with other men and States, in a general gov- 
ernment. This fact of course shows that it was possible and 
permitted that slavery should exist under it, at least for a time ; 
but it does not show that the government, created by the Consti- 
tution, assumed any responsibility for such existence. Marriage 
with a diseased person does not necessarily sanction the disease. 
There are plain and positive provisions in the Constitution directly 
hostile to slavery; and its abundant and strong provisions for lib- 
erty and republicanism are not nullified, and were not intended 
to be nullified, by counteracting provisions for the protection, ex- 
tension or perpetuation of slavery, and such counteracting pro- 
visions do not exist in the Constitution. That this is unquestion- 
ably so, is showti by the rebellion in which slavery has found it 
necessary to engage, against a government that was only carried 
on according to its principles. The assumed justification of the 
rebellion is, that our government does not protect slavery. The 
answer to this is, that it never was intended that it should ; and 
that the government is conducted according to its Constitution. 



THE CONSTITUTION IS EIGHT. 5 J 

Let us do slavery and its friends the justice to admit that, if iU 
perpetuation he indispensable, their present course is not unreason- 
able. Our republican system, as correctly described by Mr. Cal- 
houn has been found practically inconsistent with the system of 
slavery. Slavery will not, and can not, long tolerate free speech. 
a free press, general education, equal laws, and other concomi- 
tants of republicanism; and, therefore, against a government 
framed and adapted to secure these, slavery was necessitated to 

rebel. 

The provisions in the Constitution, applicable to slavery, are 
^ueral, covering other cases of social relations, and are in and of 
^emselves right, irrespective of slavery ; and therefore it is both 
unnecessary and illogical to assume that our fathers really did 
what they were ashamed of, and carefully and strongly protected 
slavery, though ignoring and avoiding its name. The coolie 
trade, as well as the slaye trade, may be prohibited and punished 
by congress ; and the right to pursue over a State line and take 
back persons escaping from labor, is a general i^rovision, appli- 
cable to an apprentice system, or to any other which a State may 
adopt, and is intended to throw upon the several States the re- 
sponsibility of the relations in them between employer and em- 
ployed, and not to commit the United States government to the 
special sanction or support of any particular system. It is mu- 
tual, and was intended, probably, as much to protect communities 
from the unwelcome influx of a de-raded class, as to give to other 
communities opportunity to recoveitheir escaping laborers. This 
is shown by the readiness with which the provision was adopted ; 
for it was not — as has been wrongly represented — the result ot 
protracted discussion or of compromise, but its idea was first intro- 
duced near the close of the four months' session of the conven- 
tion, and it was soon adopted, and without opposition.*^ Like 
that other provision guaranteeing States against insurrection, its 
ultimate and normal effect must really be favorable to liberty and 
republicanism, and not to slavery ; for thereby each State is shut 
up with the social consequences of its own acts, to the^ peaceable 
solution, with free discussion, of social questions. AYe say, un- 
hesitatingly, that slavery can not thus live ; and they who are con- 
ducting this rebellion evidently have the same opinion. Shut up 

•See Madison Papers, pp. 1447 and 145G. 



56 MISTAKES BY OPPONEIsTS OF SLAVERY. 

slavery with republicanism, in any State, guarantee the existence 
of the latter, with peace and free discussion, and slavery cannot 
long survive. 

Kot the nature or constitutional provisions of our government, 
but our administration of it, has prevented, or, rather, retarded, the 
abolishment of slavery. The democratic republicanism, essen- 
tiallv embodied in the Constitution, had to struggle fur its own 
development in administration ; and in that struggle it unt'oi-tu- 
uately allied itself, to some extent, with slavery, on the ground 
of State rights, then common to both. The alliance was contin- 
ued for the sake of power, when both Slavery and Democracy 
became "national." But Slavery and Democracy could not 
jointly conduct the government, and that happened which always 
must happen in the use of power acquired by unnatural combi- 
nations — the principles of one ally superseded those of the other. 
Slavery would not, and, if we are right, it could not safely yield. 
Democracy therefore ceased to direct the common movements 
still made in its name, and, in modern times, the inspiring spirit 
and purpose of the party called " Democratic," were, simply, 
Slavery. 

Our system of government is peculiarly adapted to territorial 
expansion. But expansion being more practicable on the side 
next the Slave States, acquisition has been made to involve the 
question of slavery ; and thus, again, has the normal development 
of the republican character of our government been checked, and 
slavery been adventitiously auvanced. Such was the case when 
the Louisiana territory was acquired. 

Mistakes made by the opponents of slavery have also done not 
a little to give slavery advantage in its contests with republican- 
ism in our government. The serltiment of the people, naturally 
responsive to liberty, has sometimes been appealed to, in be- 
half of measures found to be inexpedient, or intended to ad- 
vance the interests of a political party, otherwise objectionable. 
When Missouri applied for admission to the Union, as a State, 
it had been attached to us as territory for sixteen years. The 
United States government during all that time ought to have pro- 
hibited slavery there, as it properly might. But when the teiTi- 
tory had grown to Statehood, and the United States government 
was about to part entirely with its jurisdiction over the subject, 
it was unreasonable to require the incipient State to abolish that 



MISSOURI COMPKOMISE ABOLITION TEXAS ANNEXATION. 57 

slavery which the United States government had itself permitted, 
and thus encouraged ; especially as other States judged and acted, 
each for itself, on the subject within their respective boundaries. 
It became apparent, also, that opposition to the admission of 
Missouri was seized on, and selfishly used, by the political party 
that had then lately been driven into an almost hopeless minority. 
Missouri was rightfully admitted; but the compromise through 
which it was done, and the contest that preceded it, were injuri- 
ous to republicanism, and beneficial to slavery. Liberty had been 
driven from an assumed position, and had compromised for half 
a right, and impliedly, but not the less effectually, conceded to 
slavery the other half, and thereby slavery secured a new guar- 
anty. The friends of liberty first undertook to keep out a State, 
which, under the circumstances, they ought not to have attempted ; 
and then compromised, by accepting the exclusion of slavery from 
])art of the United States territory, when it ought to have been 
excluded from the whole, without compromise. 

Those friends of liberty also made a mistake, who subsequently 
attempted to engage congress in the general abolition of slavery. 
They undertook to do a right thing in a wrong way, and gave to 
slavery the advantage of successful resistance; and, worse still, 
allowed slavery to hold up before it the segis of the Constitution, 
and were thereby themselves unwisely and unfortunately drawn 
into hostility to the Constitution. Thence many of a whole gen- 
eration of our countrymen have learned to distrust and detest 
abolition, in every form, even such as Washington, Patrick Henry, 
Jefferson and Franklin advocated, and have learned, at the same 
time, to transfer ''constitutional" reverence to slavery, even as 
advocated by Jefferson Davis, Toombs, Yancey and DeBow. 

The annexation of Texas was another occasion on which many 
friends of republicanism were misled, and slavery was incident- 
ally helped, by association with a measure right and beneficial in 
itself. The adaptation of our system of government to almost 
indefinite expansion, as suggested and anticipated in the first part 
of this treatise, is not universally admitted. A class of our 
statesmen, respectable in numbers and standing, have denied it ; 
and have always opposed acquisition. Their extended ideas of 
the functions proper for our general government would not allow 
them to believe it applicable to enlarged territory. Only they 
who see in the several State governments the best means of pro- 



58 REVIVAL OF EEPUBLICA-NISM KECESSARY. 

viding for much the largest portion of the governmental wants of 
the people, can properly appreciate the adaptation of our S3'stem 
to expansion. Texas was desired by this class for great national 
reasons — for peace, for republicanism, for freedom; but Texas 
was also desired for slavery. Texas was acquired, and, undue 
prominence being given to the latter reason, again was slavery 
adventitiously advanced, acquiring more and more a national 
character. But when republicanism shall have resumed its proper 
supremacy* in our system, it, and not slavery, will be seen to be 
national, and then will the wisdom of the reannexation of Texas 
also more fully appear. 

An eflective reason why slavery has frequently, in the conduct 
of our government, been benefited at the expense of republican- 
ism, is, that republicanism was universally known and admitted 
to be the essential principle of our system, incorporated and 
guaranteed in every part of it, while it was equally well-known, 
and, until lately, as universally admitted that slavery was not. 
Hence, slavery, in its conscious weakness, instinctively guarded 
its life, and never willingly consented to what might in any way 
endanger itself Peculiarities in conducting the war of 1812 il- 
lustrate this. That war was begun and carried on in the inter- 
ests of republicanism ; but we can now see that the holding back 
on the northern frontier — the failure to acquire and hold Canada 
— was the work of slavery. Slavery has known that it could 
live under our system only for a while; and, therefore, like a 
doomed invalid, it instinctively took to nursing itself, and, in this 
struggle for life, it has, at length, become a vampyre. 

The revival of republicanism had become necessary, not only 
because of such misleading circumstances and errors of opinion 
as we have noted, but also because too many of our people had 
become indifferent to their political duties. They did not feel the 
same necessity for defending the interests of republicanism that 
the opponents of republicanism in this contest have long felt for 
defending and advancing the interests of slavery. The earnest 
and thoughtful anxiety which attended the beginning of our ex- 
periment of self-government, had too far yielded to a feeling of 
conscious security. Politics, regarded as a profession, were be- 
coming degraded and degrading, and immediate success being 
more prized than permanent principles, acquiescence became the 
popular doctrine which seemed to clinch and secure the advancing 



ijuraraents of davey. T!ie ' iar^ time &r Seesfont was not 

■'. . ^ ..; was annesjed — 'i.ereTr 

ti- -t Tas aot Traea me - . 

passei — tke ni^itive slave-law awaismred reactEon.; it was not 

w\ ^' \ : _ ' 

f . _ _ 

acquiesced m. ail that had been ^ione Sir davw^r. it was trme 

i: _!ini to r- ^ ' J ' .-T*i 

nor western : but ifc bekmsed to our peoDle. and to the eharaeter 
or oci' . - -lent. 

In. _ -:t fs diis contest sectrouaL except as ever-^ r"-?^ 

contest niBst be 5q. We ha^re. indee*!. tTi ff ea into the - 

speakia^ of ~ the "^ ^' " — " "■ 

States ~ and "" the 1 - - - ■ 

and reaH^r intended is not a geog- iistmction. suca as 

^ r ' ' - -jted. '^ - 

tr_ : - :onie tc 

to be between - the "West ^ and •*• the East^"^ ^ the Seaac-ari 

ci:i- : ; " -/* 

Trv this matter and die, truth, will appear. Missouri is a ^re 
5 - .- - ^ " 3a: 

classed with ^S^'^rthon States* Si? of CaliB-'raia. uh»jac:ti exten«iin;j 
farther scnth : ^rct irad it " " -" ' 'e beea 
called a S.;'ataem Srare : sc -. ..._:._. ... _ .^ ti> ex- 

elude slarerr it w^ruld become, in this parlance, a - X'jrthem 
State." New Mexioo. Ar " ?n 

Pennsylvania and Ulincis. - -_ c_.-:. _" :r._:. . . _.c. 

or Aat may hereaSer come into the TTotiHi- while slavery exists^ 
TT w the same mle. 

1 .:_..- is tiiis contest rersirnal. Personal combmations erf" 
ambitious men dcubtless there are. and ha^e been : bat withoofc 
a basis, a broad and real basis, no man or en 

could oriirinate or sustain such a coBiEest ::_ :--^ .. ._:_ -^- we 
witness. Tn.ey who lead — even the chieJs — are mere accidents 
:" the movement. Personal ani";iricn 
;liem as "with :" -* "" "*. to mikr tixem a.^ -. - : . - , , _; 

this has not c-. - movemein:. an-i does not ^ - - - Tb:ere 



60 SLAVEET OR KEPUBLICANISM. 

is no individual, and no dozen of individuals, who caused or who 
carry on this rebellion, and without whom it M'ouldnot be. TTere 
its prominent men all removed, the contest, using other men as 
its instruments, must proceed to its development or its catastrophe. 
The rebellion is a distinct, decided and almost tangible thing, 
moving consistently towards a definite purpose ; and they who 
regard it as a mere personal conspiracy, fail to appreciate the 
real and greatest danger. It is no more a personal conspiracy of 
its leaders than our republican system is a mere happy thought 
of Washington, This fact is further made evident from its ab- 
sorption of men, even of strong men, who long opposed and resifted. 
Stephens and Houston and Bell and Clemens ai-e traitors and 
rebels, as well as Davis and Wise and Pickens and Ehett. Other 
men, also, are absorbed, whose birth, education and early associa- 
tions would ha\'e guarded them from entering into conspiracies 
merely personal, but could not prevent them from being carried 
along b}" a great movement when they had once assented to its 
essential principle. Principles are stronger, and control the men. 

The single postulate from which is inevitably deduced the course 
of these men and of all men sustaining or favoring the rebellion, 
is, slavery rmist he jperpetudted. The one great principle which 
unites the true men of our country, is, rejmMicanism ravMhe jper- 
petuaied. This distinction is the solvent, and it is the only solv- 
ent, in these times and ii0this country, of the action of men, of 
combinations, and of sections. 

The men who caused this rebellion, and who sustain it, are 
all, in our country, who believe in slavery — all whose political 
thoughts, interests, principles and purposes are identified with its 
maintenance. The misfortune of these men, everywhere in our 
land, was, that the time had come when slavery required a re- 
bellion — when it must certainly begin to die unless it could suc- 
cessfully rebel against republicanism and its government. Let 
us give them the; credit of having first done all that they could to 
make the revolution a peaceable one — to change the government 
by consfi'uction and administration. But here, again, it was their 
misfortune that the necessities of slavery on the one hand, and 
the settled republican principles of the great mass of our people 
on the other, corajyelled them to he violent. They had to be vio- 
lent in the Senate, violent in the Territories, and, morally, even 



SOUTHERN BIETIl IMMATERLrVL. 61 

more violent in the Supreme Court. Hence, a republican people 
was aroused, and peaceable revolution became impossible. 

Let us also recognize the wisdom of the conductors of the re- 
bellion in rejecting all overtures of political men for a compro- 
mise. The J understood the case better than did those who made 
such overtures, and rightly judged it better for all concerned, 
either that slavery should be separated from republicanism, and 
become independent and entirely dominant, or, that it should 
yield entirely, and permit republicanism to become dominant. 
As gently as possible does republicanism exercise its sway in our 
government as it is ; and not the manner of its exercising this 
Bway, but the fact that it does exercise it, and that slavery can 
not, is the real trouble. 

That this rebellion is not sectional, but springs, rather, from 
hostile political principles, may be further shown by reference to 
antecedents of prominent men. Passing by early southern patri- 
ots, so uniformly known as republicans and opponents of slavery, 
we notice, in these times, many of southern birth and education 
who hold, nevertheless, and with consistency, to their integrity and 
republicanism. President Lincoln is by birth a Kentuckian ; Gen. 
Fremont a Carolinian.' The Charleston Mercury^ conscious of 
the fact which we notice, and of its influence, set itself to the 
task of personal detraction, in language which betrays the effect 
of the rebuke of such examples. We quote from its issue of May 
18, 1861 : 

'• Major Axdersox has thus been weaned from his country, and has known only 
a servile allegiance to a flag which gives him pay and rations ! So Scott, a mercenary 
at seventy-five, knows not Virginia as a mother." * * * " Scott and AndI:rson 
and Cassics Clat and Axor Joh.vsox and a few besides will enjoy, we fancy, but a 
brief season in the misrepresentation of Kentucky and Tennessee. These are not 
brethren — they never were brethren. They were always mercenaries, and will so 
continue to the end of the chaptei'." 

The Mercury thus shows that its standard for " brethren " is 
slavery and its cause, and not nativity. 

On the other hand, it is also noticeable that a considerable por- 
tion of the active and influential men, on the side of slavery and 
its rebellion, were born and educated at the Korth. Yancey, Sli- 
dell, i'ulee, and Albert Pike may be mentioned as specimens 
of this class. The fact of which we speak was lately no- 



62 NORTHEKN BIRTH IMMATERIAL. 

ticed, on the ground, hj the correspondent of the London Times. 
He* says : 

" For out and out Southern notions, there is nothing in Dixie's land like the suc- 
cessful emigrant from the North and East." 

A correspondent of the New York World., writing lately from 
Nashville, Tenn., says that the bitterest, most unreasonable, unre- 
lenting secessionists there, are natives of the North, mostly of 
New England ; and he adds : 

"The Adjutant-General of the regular confederate army — Samuel Cooper — was 
born in New York. Brig.-General Ripley was born in Ohio ; Pemberton in Pennsyl-' 
vania ; Whiting, Pike, Ruggles, and Blanchard in Massachusetts ; French in New 
Jersey. 

"Massachusetts furnishes as many generals for the rebel army as either Alabama 
or Mississippi, one more than Texas, as many as Florida, Arkansas and Missouri, all 
together, and lacking one of half as many as South Carolina. Of course these men 
were citizens at the South at the breaking out of the rebellion." 

But northern men who advocate slavery, and sustain its rebel- 
lion, are not merely those who live in Slave States. There is 
scarcely a neighborhood in all the North where this may not be 
abundantly proved and illustrated. 

A leading political j)aper at the capital of the State of New 
York, speaking of a correspondent's proposal of an apprentice 
system, says : 

" It is to be compulsory and we presume hereditary. We are glad to bear it. 'If 
we cannot alter things, by Jove we'll change their names, sir.' " * * * "Call the 
blacks apprentices, double their work and tighten their compulsion, and all perhaps 
will be well again."* 

And the same paper, after the bombardment of Fort Sumter, 
advised to resist the President's requisition of troops to put down 
the rebellion. f 

In short, everywhere, and without regard to section, climate or 
productions, they who believe in human slavery and in govern- 
ment adapted to it, do, and they logically must, justify and, so 
far as they can, sustain this rebellion and the revolution which it 
attempts ; for the obvious reason that the republican system es- 
tablished by our fathers is, in principle, hostile to slavery, and ir- 
reconcilable with the system which slavery necessitates. 

* Albany Atlas and Argus, June 28, 1861. t Same paper, April 15, 18CI. 



ACQUIESCENT ADMINISTEATIONS. G3 

We turn to the men on whom is devolved the duty of putting 
down the rebellion, arresting the threatened revolution, and sus- 
taining our constitutional o-overnment. 

In the former part of this essay, the personality of individuals 
and of political organizations, was purposely avoided, in order to 
avoid diverting attention from principles. This is still desirable ; 
yet it is not practicable to treat properly of this crisis, without 
treating of the persons wlio are engaged in it. This will, there- 
fore, be done directly and plainly, but not further than is deemed 
necessary in order properly to understand the great sul)ject before 
us. 

It is but just to the successive heads of the acquiescent admin- 
istrations whicli preceded Mr. Lincoln's, to i-elieve them from a 
large share of the personal blame wliich has been laid upon them, 
and to charge it home, rather, upon the people themselves. Those 
men were not elected to resist the encroachments of slaveiy. Some 
who helped to elect them may have su])posed that tiiey would do 
so; but tliey had really no right to suppose so. Those candidates 
have proved, on the whole, fair representatives of the interest 
which has elected them; and Mr. Douglas, had he been elected, 
and lived to administer the government, could not reasonably have 
been more blamed for acting still further on the principle of ac- 
quiescence in whatever new claims slavery might have made dur- 
ing his administration. The point is this: that the people of this 
country, by their elections, do really direct its policy. "VYhen — 
and not before — the people had fully determined upon effecting 
a change, it was done. It was not Mr. Lincoln wdio effected it, 
but the people who, directly and indirectly elected him; and the 
great reason, now, why Mr. Lincoln is not and can not, in his ad- 
ministration, also be an acquiescent in the demands and wishes 
of the slave interest is, that he was not elected for that purpose, 
but loas elected to stand up steadily and firmly against them. 

It is comparatively easy for a president to do what he knows he 
was elected to do ; but it would be a task, the performance of which 
is reasonably to be expected of no man — not even of a Jackson or 
of a Napoleon, under our system — to stand at the head of affairs 
in resistance to the purposes of those wdio placed him there. 

Not James Buchanan, but the Cincinnati Convention of 1856, 
and the electors who ratified its proceedings, prepared for and ne- 
cessitated the measures of his administration. To tlie candid ob- 



6-i ELECTION OF ME. LINCOLN. 

server ajDpears a reasonable and harmonious consistency through- 
out. He was purposely elected to conciliate the slave interest; 
and, that the measures in which he was required to acquiesce 
were worse, even, than those in which his predecessors had been 
required to acquiesce, is chargeable, not specially to the individual, 
ready as he was for the i-equired service, but to the advancing neces- 
sities of slavery. They who had seen his name associated with 
those of Mason and Soulo, in the Ostend Manifesto, had no right 
to be surprised at the character and conduct of his secession cabi- 
net ; and it forcibly illustrates the truth which we would present, 
that after the election of 1860, even Mr. Buchanan became some- 
what conservative of our republican system, and substituted, in 
his cabinet, Dix and Holt for Floyd and Thompson. Indeed, the 
transition of administration from Mr. Buchanan, as it was last 
conducted by him, to Mr. Lincoln, as it was first exercised by him, 
was attended by no sudden jar. It seemed almost too much like 
the continuance of one administration to be entirely agreeable to 
the special friends of either ; but it was conformable to the pop- 
ular will. 

The election of Mr. Lincoln to the presidency was undoubtedly 
an event of more than usual significance. They who opposed, as 
well as they who favored it, were right in attaching to it very se- 
rious importance; but it was the result of no fortuitous combina- 
tion. It was the intelligent and intended act of the people, but it was 
not, therefore, the less closely connected with the outbreak of the re- 
bellion. Whether the election of some other man — the continuance, 
for another quadrennial period, of an administration more acqui 
escent in the wishes of the rebellious interest — would not hav{ 
postponed or modified the open rupture, is not now a very mate 
rial question; for we think nearly all will now agree — and, oi 
this point, time and reflection will but make the unanimity mor 
complete — that acquiescence was not a remedy for our threat- 
ened danger — that it never was the proper remedy ; nay, that it 
directly and largely aggravated the danger and difiiculty which 
it postponed. # 

AYlien the war broke out, renewed evidence was given that the 
destinies of the country are in the hands of the people. They 
rallied at once to the support of their government, with men and 
with means, everywliere, save where the alternative of rebellion 
had been taken, and where the State governments were in the 



KEPUBLICANISM REVIVES. Ho 

control of the slave interest. The echo of the rebel guns which 
opened on Fort Sumter had scarcely died along the coast of Caro- 
lina before the nation was in arms. The administration of the 
national government scarcely nttered its call, before the people 
responded, with numbers and amounts almost embarrassing. 
These resources would have sooner come, if sooner called. When 
the Star of the West was fired on, and when, afterwards, the pro- 
ject was considered of withdrawing or of reinforcing the garrison 
in Fort Sumter, had the Administration asked for forces, and 
shown an unhesitating determination to use them, forces in abund- 
ance would have come ; and when, finally, they began to be col- 
lected, had it been the policy of the Administration to use them 
immediately to enforce the laws and suppress insurrection, there 
might have been greater and speedier demonstrations of national 
power. It was then evident, as was already demonstrated and 
announced in the first part of this essay, that the national force, 
and nothing but the national force, would bring us salvation. Had 
this conviction been earlier received, and acted on with the utmost 
possible promptness by those at the head of our national affairs, 
the people would not have been wanting on their part ; for they 
were in advance of their officials in willingness to apply the 
remedy suitable to the occasion — the only remedy which has 
proved, or which could prove, effective. 

Notwithstanding all untoward circumstances, republicanism re- 
vived and reasserted itself. The national heart beat strongly, and 
'the national arm nerved itself with power. Sentiments that were 
supposed to animate but a portion of the people, were found to 
be general ; and neutrality, that had lately assumed to be popular, 
disappeared before the plainer distinctions of the right and the 
i^vrong. Greater than any testimony previously borne by oyr peo- 
ij;)le to the capacity of man for self-government, is that which they 
now give ; for, in all tke passing events, the great and noticeable 
fact is, that tlie people^ and not any great statesman or general, are 
saving their country and its institutions. Not unlike the behav- 
ior of a timid soldier in his first battle, have been the manceuvres 
of our political men. Gladly would they have parleyed, or shrunk 
from the contest — some, even, who, at a distance, had boastfully 
asked "who 's afraid?" Men who had risen to positions of influ- 
ence, by persistently opposing comj^romise with slavery, had, at 



66 OUR GOVERNMExNT ADEQUATE TO THE OCCASIOiSr. 

last, engaged themselves in attempting such compromise, and, 
warning their party, had said, openly : 

" If the Repuljlican party and the Republican Administration assume and perform 
the duty, they will save themselves while they are saving the country. If they 
refuse to do it their adversaries will be the party of the country, and will claim the 
advantages of that position."* 

Fortunately for the country and for mankind, principles were 
stronger than men. The case did not admit of compromise ; the 
conflict was irrepressible, and the forces moved on to the trial, the 
question, too plain for future misunderstanding, being, rejjublic- 
anism and its government^ or slavery and its revolution f 

As our people were willing, so was our system of government 
competent. There has been no occasion whatever for the anxious 
solicitude wnth wdiich many have looked for deliverance from our 
troubles by some great man or some special wisdom. The way out 
of them was already clearly laid down by our fathers in onr Con- 
stitution and laws — too plainly for misunderstanding or mistake. 
" The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United 
States of America" — he shall swear: "I will faithfully execute 
the office of President of the United States, and will, to the best 
of my al^ility, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of 
the United States " — " The President shall be commander-in- 
chief of the army and navy of the United States, and of the militia 
of the several States when called into the actual service of the 
United States " — "he shall take care that the laws be faithfully 
executed." Such are the provisions of the Constitution. The 
laws correspond ; and congress, when called, was prompt to sup- 
ply all needed additions. The path of duty was plain before the 
Administration — as plain as it has ever been before any admin- 
istration of any government. The politicians were uselessly offi- 
cious who endeavored to contrive some method of avoiding the 
issue so plainly presented to those whose duty it was to adminis- 
ter the government ; and the error of these latter was in hesitat- 
ing to advance promptly in the path of the Constitution and the 
laws — in waiting for somebody else to do what the Constitution 
had devolved on the federal executive. They were not answera- 
ble for consequences. They were only answerable for duties. The 

* Albany Evening ./ounia?, February 11, 1S61. 



WE CHOSE MODERATION. 67 

great error of all, next to that of tlie rebellion itself, has been too 
little taith in the practical excellence of our repul)lican system 
of government. Passing events are wonderfully enlarging and 
confirming this faith ; and, it is to be hoped that never again will 
the memory of our fathers be wronged, and the arm of our j^ower 
be in any degree paralyzed by want of faith in the adequacy of 
the government which they bequeathed to us, and which we have 
so severely tried, and have not found wanting. Henceforth, we 
trust it will be universally believed — and not by our own people 
alone — that our national government may be, and should be, 
when required, the quickest, the strongest, the most energetic and 
enduring in the world. 

But the administration of our government should not be blamed, 
exclusively, for what has been participated in, and even caused, 
by the people themselves. Public sentiment in the loyal States 
having shown itself harmonious now, in the purpose to sustain the 
government and put down the rebellion, some have wondered why 
it has not been more speedily done ; and various and even con- 
flicting reasons have been given for delay. Want of military 
discipline, want of officers educated to war, want of arms, and of 
ships, want of favorable weather, want of a policy in the admin- 
istration, want of a definite purpose in regard to slavery — as 
some say, to crush it, or as othei'S say, to preserve it — have been 
assigned as the reasons ; but the true and more comprehensive 
reason is to be found in our past course of opinion and action. 
To the patient and candid. appears a divine justice, even in events 
tiiat we deprecate. Our political history and our political troubles 
constantly show forth the relation of cause and effect ; and even 
the tardy manner in which we are compelled to struggle out of 
our present troubles, is due less to inherent necessity than to in- 
cumbrances created by ourselves. 

In the conduct of affairs the nation, now, has to look fur salva- 
tion to its executive head ; but how, and for what, was that head 
selected i It can not be forgotten that it was specially chosen 
with a view to moderation. Four years before, the Pepublican 
party, standing boldly upon principle, fought an open political 
battle. Triumphant in argument, and sustained by all the dem- 
onstrations of fast occurring events, it yet failed then of attaining 
governmental control. As the election of 1860 approached, the 
clamor on the one hand against radical opinions, and the desire 



68 CONSERVATISM. 

on tlie other to avoid iinother defeat, led to much talk and en- 
deavor to "unite the opposition." Moderation and conservatism 
were much commended and favored ; and the problem of secur- 
ing these, and the support which thej could bring, without aban- 
donment of principles, was well solved by the selection and elec- 
tion of our present executive head. But the election over, these 
things could neither be forgotten nor evaded. An election in this 
country has a meaning ; and, how much soever political men may 
be charged with dereliction of principle, candor compels the ad- 
mission that principles are, notwithstanding, generally observed. 
Even James Buchanan did what he could for the interest and 
power which elected him, and did substantially as he was ex- 
pected to do. That such is the general rule, and that it is more 
and more strictly observed among us, vindicates our republican- 
ism, shows that the people do govern, and shows, too, that the real 
responsibility for national weal or woe belongs to the people them- 
selves. What, then, M'as reasonably to be expected by this nation 
from the present executive ? ISTot, indeed, that the policy of pre- 
ceding administrations, in yielding implicitly to the dictates of 
the slave interest, and the guidance of secessionists, should be fol- 
lowed ; but, certainly, that the principles of republicanism should 
be applied with moderation. 

In the contest with Mr. Douglas for the senatorship in Illinois, 
which did so much to give Mr. Lincoln his national reputation, 
the particular charge against which he had most frequently and 
anxiously to defend himself and his party, was, of radicalism — 
of disregard of southern rights, in a desire to elevate the negro to 
social equalitv. This cliarge was both made with pertinacity, and 
repelled with care, because both men well understood that it was 
regarded as an important matter by the people whose votes they 
were seeking. Doubtless that contest, while it commended Mr. 
Lincoln to the conservative men of the country, impressed still 
more upon his own mind the conviction of necessity for modera- 
tion in applying the principles of republicanism ; and not unrea- 
sonably may he now suppose that, to the prevalence of the same 
opinion among the jDeople, he owes his election as President of 
the United States. As a true representative man, is he not, then, 
bound to be moderate ? and if he is so, even to a fault, upon 
whom, more than upon the people themselves, rests the res^^onsi- 
bilitv? 



NEGATrV^E POLICY HATRED OF ABOLITION. 69 

"We can imagine how a bokl man, coming when he did to the 
presidency, might have led the nation; and how prompt decision 
and action might have aided the popular judgment ; and can see 
that notliing in our system of government stood in the way of 
such action ; but the nation had carefully avoided choosing a bold 
man, and had thereby purposely imposed upon itself a Fabian, 
rather than a Napoleonic, policy. Had the election of ISOO been 
positive in its issues, instead of negative, a positive policy might 
reasonably have been expected. Among i3eoj)le still claiming 
to be loyal, both the friends and the opponents of the successful 
candidates, treated the success as negative- Prominent Repub- 
licans even hastened to offer compromise ; the suj^porters of Mr. 
Douglas clamored '■'■ peace — no coercion^'' challenging a declara- 
tion of policy in order to oppose it, and only rampant rebellion 
was positive. Large numbers seemed to expect that Mr. Lincoln 
would do no more than Mr. Buchanan had done, when, in the 
gentlest possible manner, he dismissed traitors from his cabinet, 
and undertook to continue the government, ignoring rebellion. 
Under such circumstances the pretexts were treated with most 
distinguished consideration. All may now see how utterly insig- 
nificant they really were; that the crisis did not turn at all upon 
them, but that it was an unavoidable collision of great and organ- 
ized forces — a contest for mastery between democratic republic- 
anism, as embodied in our constitutional system, and slavery, 
with its now recognized necessities. 

Yet, singularly enough, an imperfect consciousness of the truth, 
stayed the arms of the forces on the side of tlie right. This gen- 
eration of our people has been assiduously educated into hatred 
of aboliti(jn. To fight against slavery seemed to them too much 
like engaging in forcible al)olition, and, therefore, large numbers 
took arms under protest. They protested against any sym])athy 
for the slave, or any denial of tiie master's "right" to continue 
slavery. They who have called on our government for a more 
vigorous and anti-slavery policy should remember how strong are 
the prejudices of a life-time, even among educated and reasoning 
peo})le. They might see that the same selfish indecision between 
the right and the wrong, which nursed the rebellion into life, 
stayed the hands of the peo])le at first, when vigorous force and 
decisive action should have suppressed it. The indecision of the 



70 COKSEKVATIVES — EEPUBLICAIsS liQIIGEANTS. 

executive was but the reflex of the previous indecision of the 
people. 

But the educational influences of the times have been great and 
eftective. Our government and our liberties being attacked, our 
people liave been compelled to think of their defence, and what 
that defence requires. The actual necessities of republicanism 
and its government occupy their thoughts, which before were 
too much occupied with the clamorous deinands of slavery. Kot 
merely by the booming of cannon and the clash of arms, not 
merely by great national perils at home and abroad, but also by 
small and still voices, and through a thousand avenues of reason 
and affection, have patriotic convictions come to the minds and 
hearts of the people; and not greater is the contrast presented 
now, by our martial hosts, compared with our former peacefulness, 
than is presented in the change of our public opinion. There is 
no mistaking the character of the determined conviction becom- 
ing unanimous. The cob- web sophistries woven about us are bro- 
ken and scattered to the winds ; the principles of republicanism are 
restored to their legitimate ascendancy; men, previously blinded, 
see what really is the government founded by our fathers ; they 
recognize their own duties, and resolve upon their performance ; 
and, instead of shrinking and cowering under the denunciations 
and threatenings of slavery, they clasp their arms around the pil- 
lars of the republic, rejoicing in liberty and security. 

Yet with many, very many of our people, no change of opin- 
ion was needed. The character of our government and the char- 
acter of slavery were understood by them, substantially, as herein 
exhibited, and, therefore, the contest which we witness has not 
found them surprised or unprepared. To these it comes, indeed, 
not unattended by a kind of sad satisfaction, like a long breath 
of suspense relieved — even like the breaking of morning after a 
night of darkness. 

Another large class of our people fall naturally and harmoni- 
ously into the ranks of the defenders of our republican institu- 
tions — our citizens from other lands. They came here because 
they are republicans. By all their sad and pleasant memories of 
the past, by all their bright hopes of the future, they must coop- 
erate zealously and heartily to maintain the cause of the Ameri- 
can republic, supported by the stout hearts and strong arms of its 
own people, against the assaults of the American despotism, seek- 



DISSOLVING OF ILLUSIONS. 



71 



ing alliance and support from European monarchies. Their unan- 
imity in doing so, is neither accidental nor preconcerted, but re- 
sults from the natural operations of inherent causes, as reliable as 
the principles of human nature. 

The 3'ieiding acquiescence in tlie encroachments of sla\ery, 
which has characterized the people of this country for many years, 
is justly attributable, in large degree, to their love of our repub- 
lican government, paradoxical as the proposition may seem. 
Slavery seemed to them a part of our system. It has been called 
an institution. The governmental system itself they realized to 
be good : and they were deceived into acquiescence in the de- 
mands of slavery by the threatened danger to republicanism. It 
had become the standard method with politicians, in extorting ac- 
quiescence, to praise the Union and the Constitution ; in so much, 
that when a speaker or an editor entered upon the subject, all 
knew at once that he meant Slavery. The Union., the Constitu- 
tion., and the enforcement of the laws^ practically interpreted, meant 
— - TJie Union., to be preserved only by acquiescing in whatever 
terms the slave interest might demand ; the Constitution., that is, 
the guarantees for slavery claimed to be in the Constitution ; the 
enforcement of the Laws., that is, the enforcement of the'Fugitive 
Slave Law. 

But slavery, in striking at our republican system of govern- 
ment, has dissolved this illusion, and at once emancipated the 
masses of the people from the mental thraldom which held them 
while slavery seemed to them a part of our government. The 
very aifection for our republican system which had caused them 
to seem friendly to slavery, made them its determined enemies, 
when slavery, in its doomed career, undertook to overthrow our 
government, and the error, which connected slavery with its pre- 
servation, is banished forever. 

It would have been wise in the Administration of our govern- 
ment to take immediate and full advantage of this change — it 
should even have been anticipated. Yet, that the Administra- 
tion was slow to trust to its reality and extent, was, as has been 
shown, the natural result of our antecedent history. The chance 
at that time, and the only chance, for arresting civil war, was to 
be found in an immediate and overwhelming array of national 
force; and not merely in its array, but in an unmistakable de- 
termination to use it immediately to suppress the insurrection. It 



72 FOBBEAEANCE. 

was useless and dangerous to intimate that United States officers 
would not be appointed where they were not acceptable to the 
disaffected, to treat with " distinguished consideration " governors 
who refused or neglected to comply with sworn constitutional du- 
ties, or to substitute, in any other particular, the suggestions of 
temporizing expediency, for the lAain and positive injunctions of 
the Constitution and laws. These were wiser than any policy. 
No countenance should have been given to the idea, by any hesi- 
tation implying choice, that resistance to insurrection was a pol- 
icy ; but all should have been made immediately to see and feel 
that it was a necessity — that it was the government of the United 
States, and not a political party — the president of the United 
States, and not Abraham Lincoln or his advisers — the laws of 
the land, and not the policy of an Administration, that resisted 
rebellion and revolution. Forbearance was wasted on predeterm- 
ined revolutionists. It embarrassed, not them, but the govern- 
ment; encouraged spies and traitors everywhere, and naturally 
led to the exercise, on other occasions, of doubtful and arbitrary 
power. Possibly it was then already, of necessity, a case in which, 
without the shedding of blood — even of much blood — there 
could be no remission of sins ; and yet, it seems possible that su- 
perior forces arrayed everywhere against insurrection might have 
prevented a battle anywhere. Meeting the enemies of our gov- 
ernment so often with inferior forces, and especially in the contest 
at Bull Run, insured the conversion of insurrection into civil 
war ; and the tolerant policy of fighting rebellion gently, gave the 
first real alarm to the staunch friends of our government, and 
aggravated our national difiiculties and dangers at home and 
abroad. 

Yet this very policy has, in another aspect of results, afforded 
to the country and to the world magnificent evidence of the re- 
cuperativ^e power of our popular republican system. Had the 
man on whom devolved the duty of exercising the executive 
power of the nation seen, in the beginning, as clearly as he proba- 
bly now does, our great national resources, and the duty of using 
them promjDtly, national salvation might have seemed to come 
from the man, rather than, under Heaven, from the people them- 
selves ; and history might have attributed the nation's survival 
of the crisis to. accidental or providential interposition, rather than 



INFEEEIsCES. 73 

to the i)liilo3023hical excellence of our governmental system, and 
the normaWnspiration of a whole j)eople. 

Doubtful, and even disastrous, might have been the result, if 
our federal polic}' had been moulded at this time upon the pre- 
conceived ideas or temporizing suggestions of politicians, called, 
by their admirers, great statesmen. As it is, and despite a presi- 
dent justly credited for integrity of purpose, their schemes have 
doubtless wrought the country much mischief; not merely through 
the peculation and patronage attending enormous expenditures, 
but through the jealous rivalries that would obstruct national sal- 
vation. These things being part of the rationale of the crisis, 
mention of them is not improper, but their further consideration 
not being essential to the purpose before us, they are gladly dis- 
missed. 

We have seen what are the essential principles and character 
of our constitutional system of government, and, on the other 
hand, what are the necessities of slavery, and how naturally it has 
come to rebel against our government — have seen what is really 
the impelling power behind the persons who have advanced to 
represent and sustain the proposed revolution — have, also, glanced 
at some leading events in our political history affecting particu- 
larly the questions before us, and have considered somewhat the 
action of the men who support our government. Certain infer- 
ences flowing logically and inevitably from the facts and princi- 
ples hereinbefore stated, demand our attention, and will now 
briefly be considered. 

First. The length of the war depends, chiefly, upon the Federal 
Executive. 

Second. The proper end and object of the war is, the restora- 
tion of the legitimate supremacy of the General Government 
throughout the land. 

I. Regarding the first of these propositions, it has been shown 
that the contest being one of principles essentially irreconcilable, 
is necessarily a contest of forces — a trial of strength between re- 
publicanism and slavery. They who have failed to recognize this 
fundamental truth ha\'e failed, utterly and continually, to appre- 
ciate the magnitude and persistency of the contest. Recognizing 
the nature of the crisis, it was easy, a year ago, to prescribe the 
national force as the remedy for our national ailment. iLooking 
then at the relative strenMh of the right side and of the wron": 



74 FOECES AYArLAILE FOE THE REBELS. 

side ill tLe contest of force, it seemed easy, also, to foresee wliich 
must prevail. But the result of a contest depends up(«i the forces 
used, ratlier than npon the forces possessed. Many reasons have 
herein been given, and many more must have suggested them- 
selves to the thoughtful reader, why those engaged in this rebel- 
lion would put forth their strength promptly and fully. They 
understood the rationale of this crisis sooner and better than those 
did whom they opposed ; and, when they resolved on rebellion, 
had already emancipated themselves from conscientious restraints. 
In this tliey were helped by tlieir known inferiority of real 
strength, and it was because they expected to nse a greater rela- 
tive proportion of their strength, and to use it faster, that they 
counted, nevertheless, upon success. They believed that the sup- 
j^orters and representatives of republicanism, less earnest than the 
supporters and representatives of slavery, would hesitate to use 
force, and would cling rather to peace and acquiescence. Man}' 
of the false hopes with which loyal people have deluded them- 
selves as to the failure, diversion, or arrest of the rebellion, were 
exposed in our earlier pages. Experience is demonstrating not 
only that it could not and would not stop of itself, or be arrested, 
save by the exercise of superior national force, but that its power, 
in men, money and means, was not insignificant. They who 
thought otherwise forgot that all the possessions of slavery were 
necessarily staked on success ; and that the rebellious interest be- 
ing strong enough in a given section of country to start on its ca- 
reer, could not and would not afterwards wait for volunteers. 
They forgot the essential nature of military despotism into which 
the whole people of that section were inevitabl}^ plunged by the 
first rush, and that, by allowing headway to the rebellion, every 
man and every dollar within its reach were subjected to its con- 
trol. 

A Savannnh (G-eorgia) correspondent wrote to the Kichmond 
(Virginia) Despatch : 

" Our citizens (tlie few who remained) have been arrested on the street, dragged 
to camp, shown a tent, and informed that there their habitation should be. And this 
has been done by a parcel of beardless boys, who have been mustered into the State 
service." 

This 3^^ecimen accords with the system which we know, from 
the nature of the case, must prevail wherever the rebellion domi- 



HOSTILITY OF ^iNTIKErUELIGAIir GOTERXirEXTS. 75 

nates. Even Union strength counts fur the rebels where tliev, and 
not we, can appropriate it. To their ])ower of coercing all nomi- 
nally free people within tlieir roach to contribute goods, services, 
and life to sustain the rebellion, nnist be added, also, that which 
they have long possessed and exercised — the power tx) extort 
their living, in the mean time, from the labor of their slaves. Still 
another great element of power at the service of any enemy of 
our republicanism, is, the hostility of other and anti-republican 
governments. Slavery knew this, and did not omit to prepare in 
time to secure its full advantages. 

The correspondent of the Charleston Mercury^ in the letter from 
which some extracts have already been given, written from Wash- 
ington, January 11, 1S57, when Mr. Buchanan was about making 
up his cabinet, says: 

'•Tlie representatives from the Continental Powers are stiulions in their attentions 
to southern Senators and Representatives, and it is to be hoped the interest will be 
returned with a good will. We should seek, by all the means in our power, to pro- 
mulgate, through these official sources, the principles and ideas of the South. 

'•It would be very desirable, even if our politicians were to lend their influence in 
favor of the Continental party in Europe, by having the right .sort of men at the 
most important points, commercial and diplomatic. The elements contending for ad- 
mission into Mr. Buchanan's cabinet here indicate how watchful and earnest the 
South should be in this crisis." ********* 

'•We may accomplish a great deal, however, by building up alliances and friend- 
ships on the Continent of Eurojie. We may, through proper cooperation, do much, 
very much, for ourselves abi'oad." 

The hasty recognition of the rebels as belligerents, by the two 
nations of Europe who could be most dangerous to ours, shows that 
these precautions of slavery were not fruitless. Not the least of 
the foolishness and wickedness of our past Administrations, and 
of the people who sustained them, has been the sending to other 
nations of anti-republican men, as the representatives of our na- 
tion. The 'inherent hostility of anti-republican governments to 
our own, as illustrated by the conduct of European nations at this 
time, is a marked and significant feature of this crisis ; but its 
full consideration would require more space than can here be 
spared. It was wisely calculated on as an effective ally of the 
rebellion against our republican government, and this we would 
doubtless more fully have learned to our cost, if the demonstra- 
tion of our vitality and force had been but a little longer delayed. 
Added to the other resources of the rebels, the possible advantages 



OUE NATIONAL FORCE. 



wliicli tliey miglit derive from tliis, would make an array of force 
against our government greater than has generally been supposed 
possible. 

But, on the otber hand, there seems to have been even a greater 
failure to appreciate the national force M'hich could be opposed to 
rebellion. Tlie nature of the contest being snch as we see, the 
whole resources of the people of the republic, counting every man 
and every dollar, and including even the rebellious districts, as 
fast as they could be reached, are, by the nature of the case, 
j^ledged to the support of our republican government against any 
and all of its enemies. We have, as has been shown, a govern- 
ment fully organized, capable of applying these resources to any 
needed extent. The will to use them to the needed extent un- 
doubtedl_y exists in the people, and, though slow in its manifest- 
ations, it exists, also, in the Administratiun of our government. 
How great this power really is, we may not now know, and the world 
may never know ; but if, by demonstration, it shall ever be known, 
the world will be astonished at its magnitude. Unwisely, in this 
contest, many have been seeking the limitations of our national 
power. They can only be found by trial ; and this contest, great 
as it is, can not even approximate to its measurement. Had 
England and France joined hands with slavery against our repub- 
licanism, and had our Government, responding to the sentiments 
of the people, rallied fur the contest, the array against us, includ- 
ing all whom those two great nations of Europe, with their navies, 
could bring to our shores, would, even then, have been no cause 
for despair. Necessity is the rule and the only limitation in mil- 
itary defence by a republic, as well as by other governments ; and 
in circumstances sufficiently urgent, not only our four millions of 
white men. capable of bearing arms, but another million, also, of 
our darker brethren might then be deemed worthy to strike with 
us the enemies of republicanism. 

Our numerical force, our isolation as the masters of a con- 
tinent, our grain-producing fixcilities and extended territory, are 
by no means our only, and scarcely are they our distinguishing, 
advantages. Man for man, there has never existed, anywhere, a 
people capable of being so terribly dangerous in war. They have, 
it is true, been addicted rather to the arts and the policy of peace. 
But they are wonderfully inventive and versatile. The old art 
of war is, in these days, subjected to rapid changes under the in- 



• OUR CAP.MJILITY FOE "WAR. 77 

fluence of invention and improvement. Make war the great mar- 
ket for American invention and enterprise, and new developments 
would be given to destructive power, before which the prestige 
of the Iniman machinery of standing armies and the prowess of 
old navies would wane. Already has this been illustrated to such 
extent in this war as to attract attention from abroad, and to raise 
the question among ourselves, whether our own military and naval 
systems are not too antiquated, and to suggest comparisons of 
effective results not always favorable even to those whom our 
country has specially educated to war. In tlie old art of the or- 
ganization and movement of armies, the men of this country have 
advantages. They are trained in organization. Our political or- 
ganizations, our voluntary religions organizations, our industrial, 
educational, eleemosynary, artistic, and social organizations, in 
which our people so generally participate, make the business of 
organization familiar to all ; and, as necessity requires, the same 
people readily and handily apply its principles to war. They 
make good soldiers and good officers, because they understand 
their mutual duties and obligations. ISTot years, and scarcely 
months, are required to give to their movements and discipline 
the perfection usnally predicated only of veterans ; and, impatient 
of domination as sovereigns are supposed to be, American soldiers 
do not mutiny. Not satisfied with cheerful conformity in essen- 
tials entrusted to Government, our people, through voluntary as- 
sociations, afford effective assistance in incidental and important 
details. Witness the Sanitary Commission, guarding the health 
of our soldiers, nursing the sick and the wounded, and demonstra- 
ting that our women, as well as our men, can, by making it more 
nseful and effective, greatly augment the national force. 

But the occasion which we have sup])Osed as possibly most try- 
m(r to our national f )rce, can never come unattended bv other 
great elements of power. Our traditional policy, according, also, 
with our principles, is peace. Other nations will never have op- 
portunity to attack us, even when we may be taken at a disad- 
vantage, except by placing themselves in the wrong. In such a 
war, waited against us by even two or three of the most powerful 
nations of Europe, we should stand as the representatives of re- 
publicanism for the world ; and the growing republicanism of the 
world would help us. The cause of our Federal Union would be 
the cause of oppressed luitionalities everywhere, and the cause of 



78 THE LENGTH OF THE WAR DEPENDS UPON THE EXECUTIVE. 

our people would be the cause of man. We are already too big 
and strong to be crushed out of existence at once. Our seaboard 
cities and exposed positions might be taken or destroyed ; but, 
ere the life of the nation could be touched or greatly endangered 
by the combined despots and aristocracies of the world, they 
would be called home to defend their own possessions. 'No; it is 
too late in the history of the world for outside enemies success- 
fully to attack our American republicanism. If true ourselves to 
its principles, their array against it would seem like the signal 
for the last great conflict — '"'the Armageddon of the world." 

Such being our national power and capability, notwithstanding 
the array against us, little more is needed to establish the first 
proposition of our conclusion. That force is the proper remedy 
for the rebellion, is demonstrated now by experiment, and it was 
morally certain before. A power, too great and dangerous to be 
despised or disregarded, is arrayed against us, and it will cer- 
tainly yield to nothing but the actual cogency of a greater power. 
We have that greater power, and, though it is capable of long 
endurance, all the economies urge us to use it quickly. Our 
force is abundant, our gov'ernment is competent, our people are 
willing. The executive department of our government is pur- 
posely organized and adapted for such use. It is the nation's 
agent for the exercise of the nation's force. It has the simplicity 
and directness of a single head, and within its legitimate sphere, 
which certainly includes this case, it may, congress supplying 
the means, liave all the effectiveness which any government can 
ever have — even were it a monarchy or a despotism. ]^ot the 
vigorous exercise of executive power, but the neglect to exercise 
it now, would be unconstitutional. Allowing only the time nec- 
essary for the production of results, we must infer, therefore, that- 
the length of the war depends, and has from the beginning de- 
pended, upon the Federal Executive. 

II. They who have had the patience carefully to follow our 
course of investigation, and especially all who agree substantially 
with the statement of principles herein, will find little difficulty 
in agreeing, also, that the proper end and object of the war is the 
restoration of the legitimate supremacy of the General Government 
throughout the land. 

In the beginning, they who did not see the way clear for the 
restoration of the United States authority, in all the States, were 



SLAVERY DANGEROUS, BUT NOT DIRECTLY PUNISHAJBLE. 79 

snfRciently numerous to give just cause for anxiety, on account 
of the dangers which might, at such a time, result from divided 
counsels. Their incipient plans and suggestions for separation 
and reconstruction were exceedingly mischievous. Few doubt 
now ; and nearly all agree that the federal authority must every- 
where be restored. But all do not agree that this is enough. 
Some, reacting from the alarm which first made them despair of 
the integrity of the Republic, and others, anxious to seize what 
they deem a rare and most favorable opportunity, would direct 
the action of the General Government against slavery, as the cause 
of the rebellion. If the facts and inferences in these pages be cor- 
rect, slavery undoubtedly is the cause of the rebellion and the 
war ; but it is in such sense the cause, as a defective organization 
or constitutitinal tendency is often the cause of crime in an indi- 
vidual. AYise public autliorities do not, in such case, punish the 
tendency. They punish the criminal ; and encourage moral agen- 
cies for the reformation of the tendency. 

Slavery is, for reasons which we have given, and which might 
be enlarged and multi])lied, a dangerous element in a republic. 
It is bad for any government or any people, and its principle, as 
has been shown, is utterly irreconcilable with republicanism. That 
it must certainly cease, in each and every of these United States, 
is as certain as that our people are wise — as certain as that God 
is just. But that its immediate cessation in every State is neces- 
sary to the life and development of the republic is disproved by 
years of general republican prosperity, while it has continued. 
It must, of course, be conceded, that if its existence for a time in 
some of the States will lead to its perpetuation and extension, 
and so to the destruction of republicanism, then its immediate 
and utter extermination is a necessity; also, that if, in the present 
war, or in any other that may occur, proclamation of immediate 
freedom for all, should become necessary in order to cripple our 
enemy, or to bring us needed allies, it should be made, and should 
be sustained by our national power; and this on the principle 
that the safety of the people is the highest law. But if, on a fair 
examination and understanding of our political system, it clearly 
appears that we possess therein, and through its normal action, 
abundant and certain means of resisting all encroachments of 
slavery, and also abundant and certain means of suppressing re- 
bellion, even this rebellion for slavery, then it does not a]>pear 



80 SLAVERY NEITHER ATTACKED NOR PROTECTED. 

that the proper remedy for this rebellion, or the proper method 
of avoiding similar calamities in the futm'e, consists in the use of 
abnormal means, or in changing or modifying our system of gov- 
ernment ; and if, in addition, we can plainly see that our present 
tribulations are chai"geable to ourselves — to our own selfishness, 
corruption and neglect, and not to the system of government fur- 
nished us by our fathers, it would obviously be a self-deceptive 
blunder to tinker the system. 

Notwithstanding the relation of cause and effect existing be- 
tween slaverj' and the rebellion, in the sense herein explained, it 
is easy to conceive of, and to treat, the one abstractly from the 
other. This rebellion, caused by slavery, should be treated by 
our Government substantially as rebellion against our government 
arising from any other conceivable cause should be treated. It 
should be crushed ; and the men engaged in it should be pun- 
ished by our General Government /b/* heing engaged in rehellion^ 
and not for their connection with slavery. 

On the other hand, there is no obligation resting on our Gov- 
ernment to proceed gently with the rebellion, on account of sla- 
very. Slavery has, as has been shown, no guaranties in our con- 
stitution, the guaranties claimed for it being general guaranties 
for States or for people, and which are right and proper in them- 
selves, independently of slavery ; and slavery being, in and of it- 
self, a wrong, it can claim no moral rights whatever. Unhesi- 
tatingly, therefore, should our Government advance in the sup- 
pression of this rebellion. Having itself no care or resj)onsi- 
bility whatever for slaves as such, the United States Government 
is not to be expected, and should not be persuaded to try, to pre- 
serve their character of slaves, when, in the performance of its 
military duty of suppressing the rebellion, it goes, with its officers 
and soldiers, into territory where slavery has been recognized and 
protected by State governments. The men, and all the men, 
whom it encounters there, are to be recognized and treated as men 
— as loyal or rebellious, as friends or as enemies, accordingly as, 
through their own personal conduct, they respectively deserve ; 
and if, in the absence or abeyance of State jurisdiction over the 
social relations of the inhabitants, the United States Government 
has, through its military force, and during its military occupation, 
to assume the regulation of social relations, it should undoubtedly 
do so, on the principles of right, and not on the principles of wrong 



LOCAL MILITARY QOVEE^'MEXT P,Y THE UXITED STATES. 81 

— on the principles of liberty, and not on the principles of sla 
very. The United States Government temporarily administering 
social and local government in South Carolina, has no more obli- 
gation or right to engage in, or to countenance slavery, than it 
would have, during military occupation of the Fegee Islands, to 
engage in, or to countenance, cannibalism. 

Much has been said of the moral obligations of the United 
States Government to protect the '• rights " of loyal slave owners 
residing among disloyal people. The answer to this is two-fold : 
firsts as slave owners, these people have no moral rights, and, 
therefore, towards them, as such slave owners, the United States 
Government is under no moral obligations ; and, secondly^ if not 
their fault, it is at least their misfortune, that their State Govern- 
ments, under which only, their legal "right" to hold slaves was 
secured, have failed in their functions. They held their slaves 
subject to this risk. The United States Government is under no 
obligation to indemnify them. But in States where the social 
relations of the people are still under the peaceful jurisdiction of 
the State authorities, the United States forces can not properly 
interfere. 

This subject will be more fully understood by referring to the 
character and nature of our respective governments. The United 
States Government, though of limited jurisdiction, is nevertheless 
a goveniment, and is the only war-making or war-conducting gov- 
ernment which we constitutionally have. There is no constitu- 
tional authority whatever for the war now being carried on in 
this country, except as it is carried on on the part of the 
United States Government. As a military governmental power, 
the United States Government may, most undoubtedly, adminis- 
ter local government wherever it may be required by military 
necessity, and also where, during the abeyance or demoralization 
of any State Government, by reason of war, the inhabitants of any 
State or locality belonging to tiie United States, might otherwise 
suffer for want of governmental protection. This temporary local 
government bv the United States mav be either with or without 
the formal declaration of martial law. But the United States 
Government has no right or constitutional power to establish or 
maintain slavery in the course of such local government. More- 
over, government by military law is government by force. Sla- 
very, also, is maintained by force. But two separate systems of 



82 -UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT NOT A SLAVE GOVERNMENT. 

force can not harmoniously prevail at the same time, in the gov- 
ernment of the same locality. The United States must, in such 
case, have entire control over all the inhabitants of such locality, 
with power to punish each individual for his own wrong acts, and 
can not safely permit that absolute control of individuals by others 
which is necessarily implied by the system of slavery. There- 
fore, constitutionally and by necessity, the United States Govern- 
ment can not, in administering local government, undertake to sus- 
tain slavery. Slaves, therefore, become free in such locality, not so 
much because the United States Government does anything directly 
to make or declare them free, as Ijecaiise there is no longer any govern- 
Tnental authority to hold them as slaves. Tlie United States Govern- 
ment simply treats them as men, to be dealt with by its military 
government as necessity, humanity and duty may dictate. It can 
not efiectively declare them " forever free," because, its local gov^- 
ernment being only temporary, the State Government, on resum- 
ing its functions, may reduce them again to slavery. But the 
United States Government may undoubtedly do as it has already 
assumed to do, in certain cases, by law of congress, extinguish 
entirely the claim which a rebellious individual may have to the 
services of another individual, so that that claim can no longer 
stand under State law, or any law, as the sanction for further en- 
slavement of the pei'son thus freed. 

According to these principles there is no more difficulty, and 
there should be no more embarrassment, in the United States 
Government's performing its functions in the slave States, than in 
its performing them in the free ; and, certainly, there should be 
no more embarrassment in the necessary military occupation of 
South Carolina, than there was in the military occupation of Mex- 
ico. In both cases, local regulations and usages, not in their na- 
ture wrong — not conflicting with the rights of man — and not 
hostile in their character, should, doubtless, be respected ; but 
those falling within these exceptions can properly claim no aid 
from the occupying power. In other words, the United States 
Government, having neither rights nor obligations in respect to 
slavery in the slave States, is as free to exercise its military au- 
thority in them, as in the free States, in doing whatever may be 
proper and effective to suppress the rebellion ; but, being under 
both moral and constitutional obligations to treat all men justly, 
it can not without gross wrong and inconsistency, assume, during 



CALA3IIT0US TIMK FOK SLAVERY. 83 

temporary military occupation of any State, any of the functions 
peculiar to a Slave Government. To do so, would be voluntarily 
and gratuitously to participate in the wickedness of enslaving 
men. 

The embarrassments in some minds on this subject have, doubt- 
less, grown out of-the mischievous fallacy, having, itself, a modern 
and fungous growth, that slavery is, in some way, under the pro- 
tection of the United States Government. It is not so ; States and 
peojjle^ where slaverj' may exist, are under the protection of the 
United States Government; but slavery is solely dependent upon 
State protection, save, 'till lately, in the District of Columbia and 
some other places, where the comity of the United States Govern- 
ment has been extended to cover wrong. When the people of 
slave States rebelled, and thus invited military occupation of 
their territory by United States forces, they voluntarily subjected 
their darling "institution" to exposure, stripped of governmental 
protection. Let them take the consequences. Neither the loyal 
people of the United States nor the United States Government 
can justly be called on to assume for them any part of the re- 
sponsibility. To the Government it should not be of the least 
consequence that slavery may greatly suffer in the course of, and 
in consequence of, suppression of the rebellion; and to the people 
it sliould be just cause of congratulation, that a stupendous wrong 
is writhing under the wheels of the advancing car of the Almighty. 
The moral sense in which slavery stands in the relation of cause to 
this war, justifies the people now, and will forever hereafter justify 
tlie historian in rejoicing that calamity has, in this case also, at- 
tended wrong. 

The measure of that calamity will inevitably be great, and be- 
yond what the most comprehensive human understanding can 
now calculate. In the popular estimation — which is controlled 
always by moral considerations — slavery stands already, every- 
where, as the cause of this rebellion. Its mere tailure of success 
destroys its political prestige. AVhen it was supposed to elect 
our presidents, it was feared and respected, even if disliked. 
Henceforth, and perpetually, till its last vestige shall disajipear 
from the land, it must carry with it the burden and disgrace of 
this wicked war agninst "the best government on earth," and of 
the disastrous and utter failure in which its war must inevitably 
tei-minate, on the mere restoration of our legitimate national su- 



84 THE WAR GEEATLY AFFECTS SLAVEEY, 

premacj. Our legislative halls, our deliberative assemblies, our 
churches, our hustings, our streets, fields and homes, must con- 
tinually reecho with the story of its deep damnation. 

The war will greatly have aifected the slaves themselves. Num- 
bers of them will have become practically free beyond the possi- 
bility of reenslavement, and in the minds and hearts of all, 
thoughts and aspirations will have been introduced and stimu- 
lated, preparing and leading them towards a change which, sooner 
or later, must surely come. They will have seen their masters 
vanquished, and this, of itself, means much. It is a lesson that 
no time can erase, and no blind conceal. Wise masters will know 
the lesson also, and ponder it thoughtfully ; and their wisdom 
will, we are confident, not be without useful results. The deso- 
lations spread by the war over the slave States will be lasting and 
terrible remembrancers, drawing upon slavery the curses of the 
people. The millions of money that must annually be contrib- 
uted in taxes to pay the interest and principal of the war debt, 
are items in the account which this and coming generations will 
charge against slavery. And, more than all, mourning for the 
dead, saddening the hearts of the living, will, in every neighbor- 
liood, and almost in every family through the land, especially in 
the slave States, call slavery to the bar even of human judgment. 
The non-slaveholders of the slave States, on whom this burden 
has already fallen fearfully, can scarcely fail to ask themselves, 
and then, also, to ask their leaders : for what good have the\^ been 
led into this slaughter? Slavery would not, in the past, bear 
questionings. These are questionings which it can not now escape. 
Ignorance has long closed the eyes and the ears of the people 
where slavery exists ; but some things, even the blindest eyes have 
now seen, and the deafest ears heard. 

They who fear that restoration of the legitimate authority of 
the United States Government throughout the land will prove in- 
adequate to the security and peace of the republic, can not have 
sufiiciently considered what, and how much, this necessarily 
means. It is a commanding of the peace in every State and Ter- 
ritory. This is one of the great and peculiar functions of the 
Federal Government, and the whole force of the nation is pledged 
to its constant maintenance. It is also the restoration of State 
government, in every State, to the care and administration of loyal 
men. The remark near the close of the first part of this exposi- 



EESTOKATIO]Sr OF LOYAL STATE GOVERNMENTS. 85 

tion, to the effect that State governments would not be put into 
the hands of minorities, must be understood as referring to possi- 
ble majorities, more or less disaffected, perhaps, but not yet out- 
lawed by rebellion. The Constitution of the United States pro- 
vides (Art. 6): "The members of the several State legislatures, 
and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States 
and of the several States, shall be bound by oath or affirmation 
to support this constitution." Men who refuse to take such oath 
can not properly be recognized by the United States Government 
as State officers. By the same article it is declared that the 
United States constitution, laws and treaties " shall be the supreme 
law of the land ; and the judges in every State shall be bound 
thereby, any thing in the constitution or laws of any State to the 
contrary notwithstanding." When physical resistance to the 
United States authority is overcome in any State, it can not be 
difficult to recognize the loyal citizens. The disloyal, they who, 
by active rebellion, unrepented of and unatoned for, have abdi- 
cated their citizenship, have no more right to control the State, 
or even to share in the management of its government, than alien 
enemies, who, having made a descent upon any State, should set 
up a claim to control it. If, by insurrection and war, the ma- 
chinery of any State government has become disorganized, the 
loyal people of the State, j^i'otected, and, if need be, assisted, by 
the United States Government, can readil}^ restore it. Kestora- 
tion of the legitimate authority of the United States Government 
means, therefore, the restoration of loyal State Governments and 
authority, executive, legislative, and judicial. 

Thus the governmental system established l)y our fathers, shown 
to be inherently democratic republican, and proved by experi- 
ment to be not adapted to slavery and its necessities, becomes re- 
established in every State, backed by the whole force and author- 
ity of the General Government to sustain it. That this condition 
can not possibly be made sufficiently to subserve the purposes of 
slavery, is proved by the rebellion against it. Rebellion was a 
necessity for slavery, because it could not maintain itself with- 
out. It had, before, exhausted every means of perverting our 
government as it is, to the sul)scrvience of its necessities. Tlie 
election of Mr. Lincoln showed that republicanism was inevita- 
bly to resume its legitimate sway ; and that slavery had only the 
alternative, on the one hand, to submit — to subside from na- 



86 THE EEBELLIOX JL\.KES SLAVEET FUNDAMENTAL, 

tional domination, and to contend with republicanism in the sev- 
eral States, sure to be o;radualIy overcome there, also — or, on the 
other hand, to rebel. It chose the latter ; and, failing in this, it 
will be thrown back again upon the other alternative, and under 
far greater disadvantages than before, crippled, disgraced, ab- 
horred. 

Regard for State sovereignty and State rights was wisely devel- 
oped in this country, and the philosophical teachings of our early 
southern statesmen contributed largely to such development. But 
it is a mistake to suppose that regard for this doctrine now char- 
acterizes the slave States. As perverted by the slave interest, it 
had, for some time previous to the rebellion, been used only as a 
kind of fetch to sanction aggressions of slavery, and to oppose re- 
publicanism in the General Government. The uniform course of 
Senators and Representatives in congress from the slave States, 
with regard to Kansas, and of all northern men under their influ- 
ence, clearly shows this. 

For further illustration, and also to show further the inherent 
and conscious hostility of slavery to republicanism, we give liere 
certain propositions, regarded as fundamental, introduced by Mr. 
Collier, as a joint resolution, May 15, 1862, into the senate of the 
pretended Confederate State of Virginia: 

" The General Assembly of Virginia doth hereby declare, that negroes in slavery 
in this State and the whole South (who are, withal, in a higher condition of civiliza- 
tion than any of their race has ever been elsewhere), having been a property in their 
masters for two hundred and forty years, by use and custom at first, and ever since 
by recognition of the public law in various forms, ought not to be, and can not justly 
be, interfered with in that relation of property, by the States, neither by the people in 
convention assembled to alter an existing Constitution, or to form one for admission 
into the Confederacy, nor by the representatives of the peojile in the State or the Con- 
federate legislature, nor by any means or mode which the popular majority might 
adopt, and that the State, whilst remaining republican in the structure of its govern- 
ment, can lawfully get rid of that species of property, if ever, only by the free con- 
sent of the individual ownei's, it being true, as the General Assembly doth further 
declare, that for the State, without the free consent of the owner, to deprive him of 
his identical property, by compelling him to accept a substituted value thereof, no 
matter how ascertained, or by the post nail policy, or in any other way not for the 
public use, but with a view to rid the State of such property already resident therein, 
and so to destroy the right of property in the subject, or to constrain the owner to 
send his slaves out of the State, or else to expatriate himself and carry them with him, 
would contravene and frustrate the indispensable principles of the government ; and, 
whereas, these Confederate States being all now slaveholding, may be disturbed by 
some act of the majority, in any one of them, in derogation of the rights of the mi- 
nority, unless this doctrine above declared be interposed ; therefore, 



AND REPUDIATES STATE RIGHTS AND POPULAR SOVEREIGNTY. 67 

"Resolved, by the General Assembly of Virginia, That the Governor of Virginia be, 
and he is hereby, requested to communicate this i)roceeding to the several Governors 
of the Confederate States. aBd to request them to lay the same before their respective 
legislatures, and to request their concurrence therein in such way as they may sev- 
erally deem best calculated to secure stability to the fundamental doctrine of sovViern 
civilization, which is hereby declared and proposed to be advanced." 

It will be seen that that, against which this resolution is partic- 
ularly directed, is, control over the subject of slavery hjt/ie people 
of a State. It is proposed to guard •' the fundamental doctrine 
of southern civilization, which is hereby declared" by interposing 
this doctrine above deduced, lest the " Confederate States, beino- 
all now slaveholding, may be disturbed by some act of the major- 
ity, in any one of them, in derogation of the rights of the minor- 
ity.'' There is nothing here of State rights or of popular sover- 
eignty ; but, on the contrary, a careful guarding against State 
actiun or control, and against the people — "the majority," either 
in convention assembled to alter or to form a constitution, or by 
State legislation, or " by any means or mode which the popular 
majority might adopt." 

An immediate vote on the resolution was not requested, and, 
accordingly, the subject was laid over; but the mover, in the 
carefully considered remarks which accompanied his introduction 
of the resolution, fully confirms our deductions as to the princi- 
ples involved in this rebellion. He says: "It is the repudiation 
of this doctrine that is at the top and bottom, and in all the cir- 
cumference, of the struggle in which we are engaged," and that, 
if this doctrine be not sound, slavery ought to be, and will be, 
abolished. lie is right, also, as we have already shown, in be- 
lieving that the true way to secure slavery from all disturbance 
or interference, is to leave it, not to the States nor to the people 
of the States, but to the voluntary actiun of slaveholders ; but he 
is, we think, unnecessarily difiident as to the reception of his doc- 
trine in a Slave Confederacy. It is the doctrine which will cer- 
tainly be acted on, whether avowed or not, by the controlling in- 
terest in this rebellion. AVe quote from his remarks as reported : 

''His reason for forbearing to ask a vote at this time, he said. was. that he did not 
believe the public men of the South appreciated the doctrine announced. They do 
not appreciate it at its vital and most valuable point, which is it.s denial of the power 
of the majority, in making a constitution for a State, to disturb a preexisting and res- 
ident property. The prevalence of this doctrine in the intelligence of the world can 
alone give the slaveholding States exemption from war. It is the repudiation of this 



88 OUR CONSTITDTIONAL SAFEGUARDS SUFFICIEKT. 

doctrine that is at the top and bottom, and in all the circumference of the struggle in 
■nhich we are engaged. If the principal sentiments asserted in that declaration, and 
from which the doctrine proposed as the practical result*is educed, be not sound in 
the philosophy of the subject, and ought not to be adopted into the public law, then 
negro slavery ought to be abolished, and Divine wisdom will accomplish the deliver- 
ance. But, he said, he did believe the sentiments sound and the doctrine logically 
inevitable, and that negro slavery will exist in the countries governed by the white 
race until the native land of the black man shall have been civilized and Christian- 
ized. Mr. Collier said he would only now add the desire that every newspaper in 
the Confederacy, and as many elsewhere as will, would publish that declaration." 

Seeing what doctrine the rebellion requires for its support, we 
may better understand, bj contrast, the excellence of the doc- 
trines embodied in our popular constitutional system ; and that 
the rebellion, if successful, would entirely subvert them in both 
the State and the Genei-al Governments. 

There is no necessity now, for additional safeguards for our Gen- 
eral Government against slavery. Our sj^stem as it is, enabled 
the people, when they desired to do so, to oust slavery from its 
control, and to restore republicanism. "When the rebellion, which 
slavery thereupon initiated, is suppressed, republicanism and its 
governmental system will be safe. Only culpable neglect by the 
people themselves can endanger either; and against the conse- 
quences of such neglect, there can be no reliable safeguard, and 
it would not be well for the people themselves if there could. If 
this war were attributable to our system of government, or to its 
want of any constitutional safeguards, the case would be differ- 
ent. "We can see clearly that, not the system, but the past ad- 
ministration of it, was defective ; and that the system itself affords 
abundant remedies. Dangers overcome are no longer dangers. 

Tlie right, and even the duty, of the General Government, if 
necessary, to arm and use as soldiers, against the national enemies 
of whatsoever kind, negroes who may have been held as slaves 
under State laws, can not properly be disputed. It is a right 
which should be unhesitatingly exercised, and to its fullest extent, 
rather than submit to national destruction ; but considering our 
abundant national strength, the necessity to employ them as 
soldiers is not likely to occur at this time, except, possibly, to a 
limited extent, in districts where, for a season, the lives of unac- 
climated troops would be otherwise endangered. The right, also, 
to extinguish any claim of rebels to personal services of other 
men, and to confiscate their property as punishment for treason, 



XEGEO LABOKEBS IX SOCTHEKX STATES. 89 

and towards indemnity for national expenses, caused by the re- 
Ij^lion, can not be snccessfolly dispnted. Slavery should be no 
-hield or safeguard for the rebellion ; and should afford not the 
least indemnification against condign punishment of the patricidal 
enemies of the republic- 

Bnt the rights here claimed can not properly be used as pre- 
texts ; and if they could, they could not be made effectual, perma- 
nently to liberate the slaves in any State, allowing them to remain 
there, without so altering the United States constitution as to 
confer upon the General Government the p*jwer to protect and 
perpetuate their freedom. According to our system and Consti- 
tution as they now stand, the condition of the various classes of 
inhabitants of each State, is matter for State reinilation- This 
was one of the reasons for removal of the Indians from within 
State limits. 

Some would suggest pursuing a similar policy with the negroes. 
Tliis would be an immense undertaking, and seems neither wise, 
nor timely, nor humane. But, setting aside many practical diffi- 
culties which present themselves, the discussion of which would 
lead us too far from our principal object, it may, perhaps, be 
properly suggested that such removal is not even desirable. The 
negroes and white people of the South are adapted to each other. 
The antipathies of race, so strong in northern States, do not ex- 
ist in the southern States, to nearly the same extent. The indus- 
try which sustains the whole population is supplied almost exclu- 
sively by negroes. Capitalists, being chiefly white people, are 
accustomed to direct and utilize this industry, and they are not 
accustomed to any other, and could not, for a generation, become 
thoroughly and advantageously accustomed to any other. "VTere 
the negroes at once removed, it would be economical to restore 
them, even at an equal expense. Immediate substitution of other 
laborers in their stead, would be difficult and almost impratica- 
ble ; yet, to the people and their industrial interests, it wduld be 
depressing to spend a generation in the forced substitution of other 
laborers for negroes. The negroes would probably be subjected, 
during such a transition, to far greater hardships, neglect and 
abuse, than what ordinarily attend the condition of slavery. Es- 
pecially would this be the case, under any system torced upon 
the people of a State by the United States Government. Better 
immediate and universal removal, and immediate substitution of 



90 THE PEOPLE OF THE STATES SHOULD ABOLISH SLAVERY. 

anotlier system of labor, than the long agony of any transitional 
system, coddled by external authority. 

This brings us to a conclusion on tliis point, harmonizing with 
the philosophical and practical excellence of our governmental 
system, as it is. The people themselves should conduct their own 
reforms. They may not even know, from time to time, more than 
the first step in advance, but, taking that, the next becomes plainer. 
That slavery is wrong, and ought at once everywhere to cease, all 
can see ; l)ut the way out of it can best be found by those who 
themselves have that way to travel. The United States Govern- 
ment ought not, in time of peace, to exercise jurisdiction in the 
States over this subject; and no amendment to the Constitution, 
giving to the General Government such jurisdiction, ought to 
be made, if it could. Marring the principles and harmony of 
the system by the introduction of an exceptional provision spe- 
cially to reach slavery, would be, in itself, useless and mischiev- 
ous ; for the principle here insisted on is right, not because it is 
in the Constitution, but it is in the. Constitution because it is 
right. 

The principles, system and actual necessities of slavery have 
been shown to be irreconcilable with our established constitutional 
democratic republican system of government. "We have seen that 
our republican system must certainly be sustained ; and the log- 
ical inference that slavery can not be, but must certainly pass 
away, has been decidedly and unequivocally exjjressed in these 
pages. But it seems also plain that the way in which it must 
pass away, is through the voluntary -action of the people of the 
respective States where it exists ; and that, save by example and 
moral influence, the United States Government can best and most 
effectively aid in the work, by confining itself faithfully to its 
constitutional obligations of guaranteeing republicanism and 
peace in every State, with the right of habeas corpus^ and to 
peaceably assemble and petition for redress of grievances, with 
freedom of speech and of the press, so that the people thereof 
may have fair opportunity — in the language of Mr. Calhoun, be- 
fore given — "for the free and full operation of all the moral ele- 
ments in favor of change." How great are the obligations laid 
on the General Government to comply with these guarantees — 
which it has too much neglected in the past — may be more fully 
understood by reflecting that "the sacred right of revolution" 



THE MOE.VL INCUBUS NOT TO BE KEPLACED. 01 

against oppressive government, wbicli belongs to all men, is, in 
effect, nearly nnllified as to the inhabitants of the respective States, 
by that other provision guaranteeing State governments against 
insurrection. These respective guaranties by the United States 
Government, are not merely absolute, but are also relative. As 
it commands and guarantees peace in every State, so also, by para- 
mount obligation, must it guarantee republicanism to the inhabit- 
aiits thereof, and the right and opportunity for free discussion, as 
their rightful means to relieve themselves from any oppression 
against which the right of revolution might be exercised, but for the 
interposition of the United States Government, in pursuance of its 
dut}' to guarantee peace. The free and full ojieration of the moral 
elements in favor of change, thus guaranteed to the people of the 
respective States, richly compensates for any abridgment of their 
right of revolution, by reason of the other guaranty; and, using 
again the language of Mr. Calhoun, with regard to these moral 
agencies, we add : " Xor ought their overpowering efficacy to ac- 
complish the object intended, to be doubted. Lacked by perse- 
verance and sustained by these powerful auxiliaries, reason in the 
end will surely prevail over error and abuse, liowever obstinately 
maintained ; and this the more surely, by the exclusion of so dan- 
gerous an ally as mere brute force." Thus we see that no repe- 
tition, on a larger scale, of the scenes through which the slaves 
of St. Domingo became free, is necessary here, if we will but un- 
derstand and use our excellent system of government ; for it fur- 
nishes the sure means of dealing peacefully, yet eftectively, with 
even so gigantic a social evil as slavery. 

Let it not be inferred that a return is contemplated, to the con- 
dition on the subject of slavery, including the state of public opin- 
ion, which preceded this rebellion and war. This is neither pos- 
sible nor desirable. Slavery, we repeat, must cease ; and it must 
enter immediately into its process of cessation and disappearance 
from this entire land ; and immediatel}', from this time forth and 
forever, it must cease to dominate, or even to dictate, the course 
of the General Government. They who think otherwise, they who 
hope, and they who fear, that the incubus of slavery upon our po- 
litical action and modes of thought, is to be replaced, do not know 
what has ha]ipened. The moral revolution in this respect, accom- 
plished by the election of Mr. Lincoln, and sealed now by the 
blood shed in this rebellion to resist it, can not possibly be turned 



92 DIFFICULTIES OF EMANCIPATION EXAGGERATED. 

back. Every man in the nation "svlio contributed to accomplish 
it, is, if possible, ten times more in earnest now to perpetuate it; 
and many, very many, of those who timidly or otherwise opposed 
it, would, with still more earnest zeal, now oppose a counter-rev- 
olution. The people of this country, with whatever prejudices 
they may enter upon any subject which they are compelled to 
consider, do gradually become educated in it ; and the masses, hav- 
ing no permanent interest to go wrong, and led by their instincts, or 
a higher power, toward the right, do rest, linally, in wiser and juster 
conclusions. The one fact that they will never again consent to 
the restoration to the slave interest, of the control and manage- 
ment of the General Government, will be very effective to aid 
the downfall of slavery in the States. It will speedily dispose 
almost entirel}' of the most numerous and most mischievous class 
of men laboring to advance its interests — the men, namely, in 
all the States, free as well as slave, who, without having, perhaps, 
any direct interest in slavery, have, nevertheless, found its advo- 
cacy the reliable road to political preferment. This will soon leave 
to the people in the several States, only the actual slaveholders 
themselves to deal with. It will do more. It will raise up, in 
every slave State, on the side of republicanism, men who will engage 
openly in its support. It has been shown that from slaveholders 
themselves, as a class, nothing is to be hoped towards the volun- 
tary relinquishment of slavery. But henceforth, in every State, 
the men who, from interest or principle, are opposed to slavery, 
must certainly be heard ; and ere long, these will naturally and 
rightfully control every State, shape its policy, and enact its laws. 
Out of their own necessities and aspirations will the people of each 
State build themselves up. 

Through the interested cupidity of the slaveholders, and the no 
less interested selfishness of their political advocates, inclining 
them to asperse those whom they have wronged, and through the 
groundless fears of the timid and the ignorant, the difficulties in 
the way of emancipation have undoubtedly been greatly exag- 
gerated ; and to these, we think, is chiefly owing the tendency to 
connect always with the idea of emancipation, some great and 
costh' enterprise which deter^ people from the undertaking. A 
people who have demonstrated the folly of so many popular 
alarms, intended to repress development of difl:erent classes of 
men, and who have invariablji found that every kind and class 



FREEDOM 18 GOOD FOE ALL. 93 

of men are made better, and not worse, hy freedom, and by the 
recognition of all the common rights of humanity, ought not, so 
readily, to suppose that a rule which has always worked well, and 
never ill, will be totally reversed the moment "it is applied to' per- 
sons of African birth or descent. No State in which negroes are 
now free would be at all benefited, but, on the contrary, would be 
greatly injured, by reducing the negroes in it to slavery ; and, 
according to the same principle, were the present slaves'^ in any 
slave State emancipated, it would be a change for the worse, to 
restore the system of slavery. It is better for the people of any 
State, and for all of them, that tiie negroes who may be in it 
should be free, than that they should be enslav#. " In other 
words, freedom i& better than slavery for all men, and for all races 
and classes of men (except such as may have forfeited tlie right 
by crime), and it is better, also, for all with whom they may be, 
for a longer or a shorter time, in contact. 

If these simple propositions are true, there can be no necessity 
for providing in advance an elaborate and costly system of colon- 
ization, or any other method of disposing of the negroes, before 
doing what is right in itself and advantageous to any State where 
they may be. Pertinent to this subject we quote here some sug- 
gestions which seem deserving of consideration, remarking, also, 
that their inherent force can not fairly be held any the less, be- 
cause their author is of African descent, and has himself been for 
many j^ears a slave : 

"My ans^ver to the question, ^hat sliall be done with the four million .lave« if 
emancipated ? shall be short and simple. Do nothing with them, but leave them i'ust 
as you leave other men, to do with and for themselves. We would be entirely re- 
specttul to those who raise this in.i.ii.T, and yet it is hard not to say to them just what 
they would say to us, if we manifested a like concern for them, and that is • please to 
mind your business and leave us to mind ours. If we can not stand tip. then let us 
lull down. We ask nothing at the hands of the American jjeople but simple justice 
and an equal chance to live ; and if we can not live and tiouri.sh on such tenn«"^ our 
case should be referred to the Author of our existence. Injustice, oppre^^ion'and 
slavery, with all their manifold concomitants, have been tried with us durin- a period 
of niore than two httndred years. Under the whole heavens you will find no parallel 
to the wrongs we have endured. We have worked without wages ; we have lived 
vuthout hope wept without sympathy, and bled without mercv. Now, in the name 
of a common humanity, and according to the law of the Living God. we simply ask the 
right to bear the responsibility of our own e.xistence." * * * * .< dJ notjj;^ 
with us, for us, or by us, as a particular class. What you have done with us thus far 
has only worked to our disadvantage. We now simply ask to be allowed to do for 



9i COLONIZATION NOT OBJECTED TO. 

ourselves. I submit that there is nothing unreasonable or unnatural in this request. 
The black man is said to be unfortunate. I afiSrm that the broadest of the black man's 
misfortunes is the fact that he is everywhere regarded and treated as an exception to 
the principles and maxims which apply to other men." 

Jefi'erson said, "the world is governed too much." Is it not 
possible that much of the excessive anxiety to dispose of the ne- 
gro, before recognizing his rights, is a part of this same error ? 

The slaves of the South enjoy advantages for information de- 
cidedly superior to those of the great majority of white people 
there, because of their contact Math the educated whites, from 
which the poor whites (who can not read for themselves) are 
mostly exclilied. This fact added to the other, above mentioned, 
that they perform nearly all the useful labor., may reasonably 
raise doubts, not only of the wisdom of their exportation, but of 
their being the best class to spare, in case all can not remain to- 
gether. 

Let it not be supposed that colonization, or any other enter- 
prise, beneficial to the parties interested, and not morally wrong, 
is objected to. We are only insisting that such measures shall 
come in tlieir proper way and order, and be adopted, if at all, be- 
cause they are seen to be good, rather than because outsiders pro- 
pose them. Good and useful measures ought not to be prejudiced 
by being awkwardly and rudely thrust forward. The same philo- 
sophical reason which makes it wiser and more practical for local 
governments to conduct local affairs, makes it wiser and more 
j^ractical for the people who are themselves to be affected by any 
enterprise intended for their benefit, to be themselves engaged — 
not forcibly and sullenly, but spontaneously and cheerfully — in 
carrying it into effect. 

Successful colonization is not only conceivable, but its contem- 
plation may reasonably present pictures to warm the heart, and 
to kindle the imagination. But, if possible, let there be no ex- 
ception to the rule, that the children whom our country may send 
forth from her teeming bosom to carry our arts and enterprise 
and civilization where they may be in demand, shall be led by a 
conscious affinity for their undertaking, and shall go forth, not as 
enemies, and with no envenomed stings rankling in their memo- 
ries, to convert them into enemies. 

It is not impossible that when the absolute necessity of eman- 
cipating the slaves shall be fully realized by the people of the 



KAPID PKOSECUTION OF TlIK WAR IS SUPPOSED. 95 

slave States, they will themselves manifest unexpected wisdom 
and facility in devising how to do it easily ; and also in disposino; 
of that venerable stumbling block — what to do with the negroes ? 
Indeed, it should liardly be matter of surprise if some of the most 
ultra advocates of slavery, and of a government adapted to it, 
should be prompt to labor for its speedy and entire removal and 
the thorough establishment of republicanism, when the rebellion 
and its objects shall have completely foiled ; or if some of the 
more southern slave States should thereupon take the lead in 
emancipation — if Texas, for instance, should leap forward, disen- 
thralled, while Maryland, hugging her bonds, continues to sacri- 
fice independent prosperity, for the doubtful benefits of a state of 
hetweenity. 

These views of the rationale of the crisis, are presented on the sup- 
position of a rapid prosecution of the war to its natural conclusion. 
If it shall be so prosecuted, and the end. accordingly reached ere 
long, or if, by an earlier and larger use of the national force, the 
end had been at any time heretofore reached, results, such as are 
here indicated, might, with reasonable confidence, be expected from 
the nature and character of our go\ ernment and people, and the 
nature and character of the rebellion. In such case, the wisdom 
and propriety of making the restoration of the legitimate su- 
premacy of the General Government tiiroughout the land, the end 
and object of the war, would abundantly and satisfactorily appear. 
But the fundamental principles of slavery and of republicanism 
respectively, being such as have been described, their antagonism 
may, through modified circumstances, lead to modified results. 

If, for instance, the conductors of our government, lacking con- 
fidence in the practical excellence of our governmental system, 
should, in any manner whatever, compromise this rebellion, or 
again attempt to commit the General Government in any manner 
whatever to the support of slavery, the irrepressible conflict be- 
tween its real principles and those of slavery might be indefinitely 
protracted, to culminate, possibly, in results very difi'erent from 
such as are here foreshadowed. So obvious, however, is the un- 
wisdom of such course, and so improbable its adoption, that it is 
dismissed without consideration. 

Another possible course is not so entirely improhable, and, 
therefore, deserves some attention. In ordinary contests, where 



96 UNTIMELY CONCILIATION PROTRACTS THE WAR. 

numbers of men have become engaged in hostility, even in deadly 
hostility, a spirit of conciliation and kindness manifested by one 
side, acts favorably upon the other, and prepares both for acqui- 
escence in reasonable and amicable relations. But this is where 
— as in most contests among men — a misunderstanding is at the 
bottom of the difficult}^, and reconciliation is easy when passion 
is subdued. In the present case, the real difficulty becomes more 
irreconcilable the better it is understood. It is, as has been shown, 
a contest of irreconcilable principles. The principles on one side 
harmonize with, and are incorporated into, our system of govern- 
ment ; those on the other must, if allowed to prevail, overthrow 
our system of government. For the sake of peace, too far, al- 
ready, has been carried the attempt to acquiesce in their joint 
recognition ; but, in the nature of the case, their joint control was 
impossible. The arbitrament of force became a necessity ; hence, 
couQiliation and kindness have, in this case, failed of their usual 
efficacy. But conciliation and kindness, on the part of our 
Government, are perseveringly tried, as though it were still hoped 
that these can be substituted for force. This necessarily protracts 
the war. 

Slavery, the common interest which provoked the rebellion, 
unites and controls, in a consolidated whole, all the men and 
means throughout the disaffected territorj^, in the same manner 
and by the same necessity, described in our earlier pages, in re- 
lation to the control of State governments in slave States. State 
rights, used as a pretext to start the rebellion, are no longer nec- 
essary, and are not now heard of in rebeldom, any more than 
popular rights, or democratic principles ; but all governmental 
agencies are, in effect, consolidated and wielded by the power 
which raises and controls their armies. That power is perfectly 
inaccessible through conciliation an*d kindness. The people for 
whom these are intended, are not reached and can not be reached 
by them, till that power is beaten down, and with it the barriers 
of prejudice and hatred which it has raised so high and strength- 
ened so broadly. 

That power will never voluntarily submit to the restoration of 
the legitimate supremacy of our republican government. It says 
so, emphatically and continually, and it is time to believe that, 
in this, it says truly. Not unreasonably, perhaps, does it calcu- 
late on the continuance, and possibly the increase, of the anxiety 



WAR SUFFOCATES SLAVERY; BUT PEACE IS BEST. 97 

to conciliate, with the protraction of the war; and it liopes for all 
the chances which might still render possible the attainment of 
its object. Days and months as they pass, accustom to its sway 
the i^eople whom it can reach ; and while this power is embodied 
anywhere in a State, the United States Government can only hold 
by its superior power any territory in the State. But it has been 
shown that the United States Government can not properly lend 
itself to the support of slavery. It is not, theoretically or consti- 
tutionally, a slaveholding government, and, by abolishing slavery 
wherever it has the power, it is harmonizing its practices with its 
principles. It can not properly make the temporary administra- 
tion of local government in States an exception; and thus, any 
State law of slavery, is, for the time, in abeyance during the ad- 
ministration of local government in a slave State by the United 
States Government, under military necessity. Not, therefore, by 
any direct act of the United States Government abolishing sla- 
very in the States, but simply by neglect and refusal to adminis- 
ter the State law, slavery lacks enforcement where the armies of 
the Union go. If this continues, slavery rapidly dies. It is not 
probable that this result has been contemplated as one of policy ; 
but it is not the less sure. Its poetic justice might suggest the 
idea of design; but we can not safely pursue justice in this way. 
Its cost is too enormous, and its results can better be obtained in 
the direct and normal way. "War is not the business of this peo- 
ple, and it should not be permitted to become such, even for the 
sake of thei-eby suffocating slavery. * The volunteers enlisted in 
military service should, as soon as possible, become peaceful and 
industrious citizens. Their officers should cease to exercise arbi- 
trary authority, and the people should again become the dispens- 
ers of patronage. The General Government should, as soon as 
may be, cease to direct all the public energies, and the States 
should resume their relative significance and importance. Great 
as would be the future benefit to the country and to mankind, if 
slavery in the States were extinguished, protracted war, with its 
centralizing tendencies, its enormous expense, its demoralization, 
its alienation, its sufferings, bereavements and desolations, is too 
much to pay for the accomplishment of such purpose ; especially 
when this desired result is so sure to follow the restoration of the 
legitimate supremacy of the General Government, guaranteeing 
peace and republicanism throughout the land ; a result, let us re- 



98 ONLY THE " CONFEDERACY CAN SUSTAIN GUEEEILLAS- 

peat, that is by none so well understood as by those who initiated 
this rebellion on purpose to escape it. 

A continued guerrilla warfare by the minions of slavery is not 
to be apprehended from the omission to extinguish slavery by 
United States force. The organized forces of the rebellion are 
what now sustain such guerrilla warfare, wherever it exists ; and 
when the armies of slavery shall be overcome and dispersed, and 
its (juasi national organization annihilated, the people of the sev- 
eral States, through their State Governments, sustained by the 
General Government, will easily dispose of guerrillas. It will 
plainly be for their interest to do so. State Governments are in 
no respect dangerous or unfriendly to our General Government ; 
but the only real and considerable dangers proceed from combi- 
nations, extending through many States, and assuming to oppose 
or to usurp the functions of the General Government. "When the 
rebellious Confederacy that slavery has organized, shall be entirely 
overcome and extinguished, the rebellion itself will be ended, and 
the legitimate supremacy of the General Government be reestab- 
lished throughout the land. 

This idea brings into view the exceeding folly of the proj)osi- 
tion sometimes suggested, from ignorant or unfriendly sources, 
of an armistice, negociation, or compromise with the hostile 
power. The very source of all the difficulty is in the mere exist- 
ence of such hostile power. To negociate with it or to recognize 
it in any way whatever, is to sanction the greatest possible polit- 
ical evil. ISTo political power has a right to exist hei'e for one 
moment, save the States and the General Government ; and the 
only way towards peace is the complete annihilation and disap- 
pearance of any such pretended intermediary power. It can not 
exist one moment after the legitimate supremacy of the General 
Government is reestablished throughout the land ; and the mo- 
ment this is done, there is peace. 

It is, therefore, so simple as to seem but the repetition of an 
identical proposition, to conclude — as we unhesitatingly do, after 
this review of all essential suggestions on the subject — that 
tlie proper end and object of the war is the restoration of 
the legitimate supremacy of the General Government throughout 
the land. 

Not only does this method commend itself to our judgment, 
but we see that it is the one designed by the fathers of the repub- 



PROPITIOUS CIECUMSTANCES.. ^^ 

lie It has only failed hitherto in certain respects, because of our 
culpable neglect to apply our republican principles. Attempting 
to bc\vise"ibove what was written, and trustnig to expedients 
rather than to principles, we have cultivated disaffection into i;e- 
bellion and civil war. Are we not justly punished tor our polit- 
ical sins? Our svsteni of government as it is, is competent, not 
only for the present emergency, but for all future emergencies 
which now seem likely to arise ; and the suggestions to aniend it 
as thoii-h it were mechanical machinery which wears out, instead 
of beino-, as it is, a philosophical application of eternal principles, 
ori-iuatt not in the wisdom of statesmanship, but m the tempo- 
rizhio- plans of political expediency. Let us elevate ourselves to 
the c.mprehension and management of this most excellent and 
beautiful svstem. It is intended and adapted for the people s 
use Discussion and agitation should not be avoided. They are 
alwavs and everywhere the necessary attendants of wise deliber- 
atiun": Adopting again the language of Mr. Calhoun: They 
are indispensible means, the only school (if I may be allowed he 
expression) in our case, that can diffuse and fix in the mmd of the 
community the principles and duties necessary to uphold our 
complex but beautiful system of governments. In none hat evei 
existed are they so much required; and iiyione were they ever 
calculated to produce such powerful effect." 

As our Government is good, so are our circumstances, in some 
most important respects, propitious. _ 

Not accidentally, but designedly, the American people have 
now as the executive head of their General Government, a man 
of honest purpose, logical mind, and such firmness as requires 
not the aid of wordy demonstration. If cautious and conciia- 
tory he is also true. He is not stationary, like the Bourbons, but 
procn-essive, like Channing,' because, in spite of conservative ten- 
dencies in his political education, he believes in pnncip es, and 
fears not to follow where he sees they lead. Some who have 
praised him as conservative, may yet be shocked by his radical- 
sm- and some, who think him slow, may find themselves aston- 
ished at his advance. For ourselves, we believe that his course 
of administration, as it proceeds, will prove a new _in"strat,on ot 
the old truth : "The path of the just is as the shining light, that 
shineth more and more unto the perfect day." 



100 

HOPES. 



Our peoijle are now showing themselvp^ wm-fl.^ f .i • 
ernment and of their destiny.^ SupZelZ T'fZ '\"' ^'" 
almost omnipotent power, th'e violfn^tK^uM ^ 
reason, thej are, while in this performance of a hom! TY I 
duing, also, the prejudices of a world Thn ! !^' '''^^ 

tends th exhihiL^ of gigantic ::^oJ'^:::^i:':f^ 

security for national peace. The revf vnl nfl . -^ ^'®^ 

ou^elves encourages L reJatZXt;'' """"^ 

"and our hopes 
Go forward to the glorious traiu of years 
AVhen all the clouds of strife that darken'earth 
And hide the face of heaven, shall roll away • 

t^ifV f ''"' '""""* '""'^"^^' Pe«ce and love 
bhall light the drearest walks of human life." 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



012 028 262 1 



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